GRAMINH^E. 



1011 



only 2 flowers, the glumes broad and truncate at the top or slightly 

 jagged. 



1. Water Catabrose. Catabrosa aquatica, Beauv. 

 (Fig. 1232.) 



{Aira, Eng. Bot. t. 1557.) 



A glabrous, tender, pale-green peren- 

 nial ; the stems procumbent, and creep- 

 ing or floating at the base, rooting at the 

 nodes, and often 2 or 3 feet long ; the 

 flowering branches erect. Leaves short, 

 flat, and flaccid. Panicle 4 to 6 inches 

 long, consisting of many sets of half- 

 whorled, unequal, slender, and spreading 

 branches. Spikelets 1 to near 2 lines 

 long. Outermost glume very short and 

 small, the second larger, broad, and trun- 

 cate at the top like the flowering ones, 

 but much shorter: these are scarious, 

 and slightly toothed or jagged at the 

 top, with very prominent ribs. Paleas 

 similar but rather smaller, with only 2 

 ribs. 



In shallow pools, and ditches, in Europe and Bussian Asia, from the 

 Mediterranean to the Arctic regions. Generally, although thinly, scat- 

 tered over Britain. Fl. early summer. 



Fig. 1232. 



XXXVII. MOLINIA. MOLINIA. 



A single species, very near Poa and Fescue, differing from the for- 

 mer in the much pointed glumes, from Fescue in the smaller and 

 rather less flattened spikelets. There is also, at the base of the palea 

 of the uppermost flower, a small, bristle-like appendage, being a con- 

 tinuation of the axis of the spikelet, and bearing sometimes the rudi- 

 ment of another flower, although less conspicuous than in MelicJc. 

 This rudimentary terminal flower may however be occasionally ob- 

 served in most of the allied genera. 



1. Purple Molinia. Molinia C93rulea, Mcench. (Fig. 1233.) 



{Melica, Eng. Bot. t. 750.) 



A rather coarse, stiff perennial, often 3 feet high, with the leaves 

 chiefly radical, forming large tufts, long and flat, rather stiff", and 

 slightly hairy on the upper side. Panicle narrow but loose, 6 inches 



