6 THE NATURAL HISTORY OF RBITISH GRASSES. 
Festuca duriuscula—Hard fescue. 
Dactylis glomerata—Cocksfoot. 
These always grow in tufts when sown thin for perma- 
nent pasture, if the land be poor, but is soon prevented by 
depasturing, bush, or fine-tine harrowing and rolling: these 
operations take away all mosses and dying grasses which 
have a tendency to rot, and thus form a humus soil around 
the roots—a circumstance prejudicial to the growth of good 
turf. Rolling presses the whole together, and makes the 
soil firmer, a matter of great consequence in maintaining a 
pasture. Indeed, fertilizers and mechanical processes may 
be looked upon as the means which, after all, keep meadows 
in the form we now see them; as in truly wild nature, there 
would be a greater tendency to a distinctive mode of growth 
than to the formation of a matted turf, as even simply 
depasturing supplies to a considerable extent, all the requi- 
sites I have adverted to, as necessary for the prevention of 
the jungle mode of growth, in many even of our meadow 
grasses. 
2. Aquatic or Water Grasses are those which elect to 
grow by the margins of rivers, in brooks and ditches, or 
around the edges of ponds. These are not very numerous, 
nor are they generally of any agricultural value; at the 
same time, as they may sometimes be seen, especially in 
summer, without the contiguity of surface water, they afford 
excellent indications of a swampy and wet soil; and as 
some of them prefer stagnant water, when they occur in 
ditches, or in the open meadow, these should at once inform 
us that our drainage is imperfect, and point to the neces- 
sity of draining if not previously done, or if already drained 
to the cleaning out of ditches, and looking more particularly 
to their levels. The following are amongst some of our 
more common water-grasses :— 
Arundo Phragmites—Common reed. 
Phalaris arundinacea—Reed canary-grass. 
Glyceria aquatica (Poa)—Reed meadow-grass. 
Poa fluitans—Floating meadow-grass. 
