HITCHCOCK AND CHASE NOKTH AMEKICAN PANICUM. 



299 



axis glabrous or pubescent, often viscid, the flexuous branches ascending, spikelet- 

 bearing from near the base; spikelets 2.3 to 2.6 mm. long, 1.1 to 1.3 mm. wide, ovate, 

 pointed, glabrous or obscurely puberulent; first glume less than one-sixth as long as 



the spikelet; second glume and sterile lemma 

 strongly nerved, exceeding the fruit and form- 

 ing an abrupt point beyond it; fruit 1.8 mm. 

 long, 1 mm. wide, elliptic. 



Autumnal form erect, branching from the mid- 

 dle and upper nodes, the branches ap pressed, 

 somewhat longer than the internodes, finally 

 bearing fascicled branchlets and forming dense 

 oblong masses along the upper part of the primary 

 culm, the sheaths, especially the later ones, 

 densely papillose-hirsute, the flat, reduced blades 

 ovate-lanceolate, reduced in length much more 

 than in width, the panicles partly or entirely inclosed in the sheaths. 



This species is very variable in the amount of pubescence; even on the same plant 

 are often found glabrous and hispid sheaths or glabrous and pubescent blades. Other- 

 wise it is an unusually uniform species. 



Fig. 338. — P. scabriusculum. From 

 type specimen. 



DISTRIBUTION. 



Moist ground, especially along ditches, streams, and swamps, near the coast, south- 

 east Virginia to Florida and eastern Texas. 



New Jersey: Atlantic <3ity. Long in 1909 (Phila. Acad. Herb.). 

 Virginia: Norfolk County, Kearney 1798; Dismal Swamp, Tyler in 1905. 

 North Carolina: Roanoke Is- 

 land, Chase 3235; Wilsons 



Mills, ChaseSlOl; Wilmington, 



Chase 4600, Hitchcock 595, 



Kearney 270. 

 South Carolina: Orangebm-g, 



Hitchcock 438, 1378; Aiken, 



Ravenel. 

 Georgia: Bullock County, i?arper 



881; Leslie, Harper 410. 

 Florida: Jacksonville, Curtiss Q, 



4878; Duval County, Curtiss 



3610; Baldwin, Combs 67; 



Washington, Combs 616; without locality. Chapman. 

 Alabama: Flomaton, Hitchcock 1052, Tracy 3643; Mobile, Kearney 27, 39; Mobile 



County, Mohr in 1888. 

 Mississippi: Beauvoir, Tracy 4617; Biloxi, Tracy 4569. 

 Louisiana: New Orleans, Drummond (Gray Herb.). 

 Texas: Nona, Nealley 38 in 1892; without locality, Nealley in 1885, Wright (Gray 



Herb.). 



""^ 182. Panicum cryptanthum Ashe. 



Panicum cryptanthum Ashe, N. C. Agr. Exp. Sta. Bull. 175 : 115. 1900. "Collected 

 by the writer in swamps at Wilson's Mill, N. C, in July 1897." The type, in Ashe's 

 herbarium, is a specimen arbitrarily chosen from among four bearing the label, "Wil- 

 son's Mill, N. C. July 15, 1897. W. W. Ashe collector," and with the additional 

 data, "In a small swamp on north side of railroad about one mile west of the station." 

 The name does not appear upon any of the sheets, but these plants agree with the 



Fig. 339. — Distribution of P. scabriusculum. 



