LV. GEAMINEiE. 881 



margins free, or very rarely more or less united ; Made entire, usually narrow, linear, 

 sometimes oblong or oval, margins very often scabrid, nerves parallel [united 

 by transverse venules] ; stipule axillary, adnate by its dorsal face to the sbeath, and 

 produced as a membranous tongue (ligule). Inplobesoence of spikelets arranged 

 along an axis {rachis), sometimes sessile on tbe rachis {spiked), sometimes borne 

 on branched peduncles and diffuse {panided) or shortly branched (a spicate panicle), 

 rarely fascicled and enclosed in a common spathe; spikelets 1- several-flowered, often 

 containing sterile flowers, each with an involucre of two scaly opposite bracts 

 (glumes),^ nearly on a level, one embracing the other, sometimes absent. Flowers 

 § , rarely diclinous monoecious or dicecious, sometimes polygamous, each with 

 2 sub-opposite bracts {paleoe or glumelles), of which the lower and outer is largest, 

 unequally nerved or keeled, furnished with a terminal or dorsal or basilar awn, or 

 muticous.; upper and inner glumelle sheathed by the lower, emarginate or bifid, 

 rarely obsolete or arrested, usually with no midrib, and having 2 lateral nerves; 

 Pebianth imperfect, very rarely 0, composed of whorled hypogynous membranous 

 fleshy irregular scales {squamules), which are free or connate, normally 3, the 2 outer 

 alternate with the palese, the inner opposite to the upper palea, often heteromorphous 

 and narrower, usually obsolete. Stamens hypogynous, definite, usually 3, sometimes 

 6 {Oryza, PotamopMla, Hydrochloa; Zizania, Pharus, Nastus, Bambusa, &c,), rarely 4 

 {Microlwna, Anomochloa, Tetrarrh&na) , or 2 {Anthoxam,thum, &c.), or 1 {Zfniola, &c.), 

 very rarely indefinite, when the ovary is arrested {Luziola, Pariana) ; in the 

 hexandrous flowers whorled around the ovary ; in the triandrous, 2 opposite to the 

 lateral nerves of the upper palea, and 1 to the lower glumelle ; in the diandrous 

 the outer is wanting ; in the monandrous the. outer only is present ; filaments capil- 

 lary, free, or sometimes cohering at the base ; anthers dorsifixed, 2-ceUed, linear, 

 usually 2-fid at the two ends, dehiscence lateral, longitudinal, or very rarely apical. 

 OvAET free, 1-celled, 1-ovuled; styles 2, very rarely 3, free or connate at the base, 

 sometimes united into an undivided style ; stigmas with simple or branched hairs ; 

 ovule adnate to the posterior part of the ovary throughoi;it its length, or by its base, 

 very rarely suspended below the top. Pkuit free or adnate to one or both of the 

 glumelles, dry, indehiscent ; pericarp usually thin, membranous or coriaceous, and 

 adhering to the seed {caryopsis), rarely ipembranous and dehiscent [Sporoholus), 

 usually presenting a dark mark at the level of the hilum, where the testa is attached 

 to the pericarp; albumen farinaceous, or between fapnaceous and horny, very thick. 

 Embkto outside of the albumen, in a pit at the base of its anterior face ; cotyledon 

 scutellate, often split along its outer face, and showing the radicle and plumule ; 

 plumule terminal, conical, composed of 1-4 primary convolute leaves ; radicle basilar, 

 thick, obtuse, often with several tubercles which are perforated at germination by 

 radical fibres, each springing from one of these tubercles, and surrounded at their 

 base by a small sheath (cbleorrhiza), the remains of the perforated portion of the 

 embryo. 



1 By recent authors tbe term glume is, as here, con- called emptij glumes ; and the lower or outer glumelle is 

 fined to these two tracts; by other authors these are ealled flowering glume.— Ed. 



3l 



