MANUAL OF THE GRASSES OF THE WEST INDIES Boe 
Penicillaria spicata Willd., Enum. Pl. 1037. 1809. 
Plant annual; culms robust, as much as 2 m or more tall (depau- 
perate escaped plants much smaller), densely villous below the panicle; 
blades flat, cordate at base, as much as 1 m long and 5 cm wide; 
panicles cylindric, stiff, very dense, as much as 40 to 50 cm long and 
2 to 2.5 cm thick, pale, bluish or tawny; bristles about as long as the 
spikelets. 
Known only in cultivation. Common in Africa and occasional in 
the southern United States and other American countries. Not 
grown in the West Indies, but depauperate specimens have been 
collected along the roadsides in Haiti. 
Haiti: Port-au-Prince, Ekman H 3014. Ennery, Leonard 8830. 
5. Pennisetum purpureum Schumach., Beskr. Guin. Pl. 64. 1827. 
Guinea. NAPIER GRASS. 
This tropical African species is being introduced as fodder in various 
parts of tropical America under the name of Napier grass and elephant 
erass. It is a robust leafy tufted branching perennial, 2 to 4 m tall, 
with elongate blades 2 to 3 cm wide, and dense stiff, tawny or pur- 
plish panicles, the fascicles sessile, the sparsely plumose bristles ex- 
ceeding the 2 or 3 unequally pediceled spikelets. The plants escape 
occasionally from cultivation. 
Cupa: Aspiro, Léon 15555. Experiment Station, Santiago de las 
Vegas, Hitchcock 23247, 23251. Cruz de Piedra, Léon 14247. 
Haiti: Port-au-Prince, Ekman H 9127. 
Dominican REepuBLIc: Jaina, Faris 92. 
PurErtTo Rico: Joyuya, Perkins in 1928. 
VirGin [suanps: St. Croix, Thompson 466. 
LrEwarp Isutanps: Antigua, Bor 101. 
6. Pennisetum setosum (Swartz) L. Rich., in Pers., Syn. Pl. 1: 72. 
1805. 
: poeta setosus Swartz, Prodr. Veg. Ind. Occ. 26. 1788. West 
ndies. 
Pennisetum alopecuroides Desv.; Hamilt., Prodr. Pl. Ind. Oce. 11. 
1825. Not P. alopecuroides Spreng., 1825. West Indies. 
Pennisetum erubescens Desv.; Hamilt. Prodr. Pl. Ind. Occ. 11. 
1825. St. Thomas. 
Pennisetum hamiltonir Steud., Nom. Bot. ed. 2. 2: 297. 1841. 
Based on P. alopecuroides Hamilt. 
Perennial, in loose clumps, sometimes of 30 or more culms; culms 
usually 1 to 2 m tall, slender to robust, subcompressed, ascending or 
suberect from the more or less geniculate, sometimes rooting lower 
nodes, bearing one to several flowering branches from the lower and 
middle nodes, scabrous below the panicle, otherwise glabrous; 
blades mostly rather firm, 10 to 40 cm long, 4 to 18 mm wide; panicles 
terminating the primary culm and branches, occasionally one or 
two axillary panicles borne in the upper sheaths, 10 to 25 cm long, 
8 to 10 mm thick, excluding the elongate bristles, rather dense, 
usually somewhat nodding, from pale yellow to dusky purple or 
brown; fascicles sessile, at first ascending, spreading or reflexed in 
age; bristles unequal, the outer delicate, most of them shorter than 
the spikelet, the inner densely silky-plumose below, the hairs directed 
inward, those of the erect lower part of adjoining bristles matted and 
beautifully crimped; spikelets solitary (fig. 329). 
