IN TENNESSEE. 235 



as long as the glumes, the upper one truncated. Growing in large patch- 

 es about Tullahoma, Cowen, etd. 



All parts of the plant are equally pliant and succulent ; 

 it sprouts again, after being pastured down, with numerous 

 new culms, and its growing season lasts from May till frost. 

 The culms stand about 2 feet high, and it is naturally social. 

 As far as I observed I found it always growing in 

 patches. It grows in low and small tufts and sticks firmly 

 to the soil. I' would very earnestly recommend to try it 

 under cultivation. In addition to my own observations, I 

 would state that the Agricultural Report for 1870, in a pa- 

 per on the grasses of the plains and the eastern slope of 

 the Rocky Mountains, after enumerating 142 species of 

 grasses indigenous over that region, and selecting twelve of 

 them as the most valuable of them all, accepts Sporobolus 

 Heterolepis, an allied species, as one of them. It is there 

 said, " This species is peculiarly palatable to cattle, and they 

 are seen roving over rich pastures of other species in search 

 of it. This is also said to be the winter forage species of 

 cattle, where it abounds, affording the rich winter pasturage 

 of the farmers and herders of Kansas. It flourishes 

 chiefly on the moister portions of the plains, and many local 

 areas are almost exclusively occupied by it." 



AEBHENATHEEUM AVENACEUM, Beauv. — (Tall Oat 

 Orass.) 



Spikelets open, panicled, two-flowered, with a rudiment of the third 

 flower; the middle awn flower perfect, its lower palet barely bristle, point- 

 ed from near the top ; the lowest flower staminate only, bearing a long, 

 bent awn below the middle of the back. Looking much like oat. Pe- 

 rennial. Has been tried with good results in cultivation. Flowering 

 in June. 



Not very frequent in this State. Old fields, Clifton pike, 

 Nashville. 



TRICUSPIS SESLEROIDES, r Darr.-(TaU Bed Top.) 



Perennial; culm upright, 3-5 feet high, very smooth, as are the 

 flat leaves, panicle large and compound, the rigid, capillary branches 

 •preading, naked below ; spikelets shining, purple. 



