AGEICULTURAL GEASSES. 49 



cross between Eye Grass and Festuca fluitans, or between Eye 

 Grass and Festuca pratensis. He states the reasons why such 

 an opinion was groundless, and Professor Buckman's and Mr. 

 Watson's experiments seem to me to prove the accuracy of 

 Sinclair's conclusions. Some eminent botanists stiUhpld the 

 opinion that Festuca loliacea is a cross between Festuca pratensis 

 and Perennial Eye Grass. But the experiments I have mentioned, 

 where loliacea plants transplanted to garden soil have reverted 

 to the true pratensis type, appear to render the theory of cross- 

 fertilisation unnecessary in order to account for a change in the 

 character of the plants. 



It is difficult, if not impossible, to obtain a true and pure 

 sample of Festuca loliacea, and as land which favours the growth 

 of Festuca pratensis will often in three or four years develop the 

 chief characteristics of the former, I do not consider it worth 

 while to attempt to procure seed of F. loliacea, admirable as the 

 plant is on soils where it will remain constant. 



Sinclair found that Festuca loliacea formed the principal part of 

 the herbage in the meadows bordering the Trent, but he alluded 

 to the difficulty of obtaining seed at that time, and went so far as 

 to express the opinion that the plant could only be cultivated by 

 root-division ; and Curtis remarks : ' The seeds of this grass being 

 in the same predicament as those of Festuca elatior, the plant can 

 only be propagated in the same way.' 



Glyceria fluitans, or Floating Sweet Grass, somewhat re- 

 sembles Festuca loliacea in its flowering culms, but the two 

 grasses are perfectly distinct. The herbage of the former is very 

 much taller, and the habit of growth entirely different. 



FESTUCA HETEROPHYLLA 



{Various-leaved Fescue). 



Festuca heterophylla was introduced into England in 1814. 



It comes into flower rather earlier than Festuca ovina tenuifolia, 



and ripens its seed about the middle of July. Sinclair calls it 



