Graminece.] 



CHINA. 



231 



Retz and Wahlenberg attribute to this a single purely male spike, remote female ones, and mention that 

 the whole plant is a span long : our species is obviously considerably larger, the female spikes are not re- 

 markably remote, and the mixture of female flowers on the terminal spikes may be the effect of accident. 

 On the other hand, the description of the fruit, of the scales, of the sheaths to the bracteee, of the bracteas 

 themselves, and especially their being about equal in length to the spikes, the number of stigmas, and the 

 smoothness of the culm, are the same in both. We scarcely entertain a doubt respecting their identity.] 



Ord. XC. GRAMINECE.* Juss. 



Trib. I. Panice^e. N. ab E. 

 1. PASPALUS. Linn. 



a. Genuini. N. ab E. 



1. P. scrobiculatus ; spicis paucis alternis rhachi contiguis, rhachilla plana repanda spicu- 

 las singulas (biseriales) aequante glabra margine scabra, spiculis suborbiculatis glabris, gluma 

 3-7 nervi, valvula neutra utrinque plicato-scrobulata, foliis linearibus acuminatis vaginisque 

 glabris vel lamina basi pilosa. — P. scrobiculatus. Linn. Mant. I. p. 29. Flugg. Mon.-p. 86. 

 Kunth. En. l.p.43.— P. Coromandelianus. Lam.— P. Kora. Willd.—Rhced. Hort. Mai. 12. 

 t. 44. 



[This varies with the glume 5-7-nerved and the spikes either in pairs or several, or 3-nerved, and then the 

 spikes are usually in pairs : in the Chinese specimens ( Vachell, " Z.") referred here by us, the glumes are 

 3-nerved; there are several (3-5) spikes, and the spikes are more spreading than usual; the plaits on the 

 glumes, which are rather small for this species, are not very conspicuous. It is the only species, we believe, 

 from the East, with orbicular spikelets placed in two rows on the rachis.] 



b. Panicoidei. N. ab. E. 



2. P. Chinensis; racemis 4-5 alternating approximatis fastigiatis, spiculis geminis ternisve 

 ovali-lanceolatis imbricatis, rhachi plana spiculis paullo latiori, gluma valvulaque neutra 



* The terms used by Professor Nees v. Ese.ibeck being not quite the same as those employed by Trinius, the follow- 

 ing extract from his Memoir on the Graminem, in Wight and Arnott's Prodrumus Fl. Penins. Ind. Or. vol. 2, (ined. ) 

 may be acceptable: — 



" 1. As to the distribution of the spikelets. The words homogamous (viz. spikelets) and heterogamous signify the dis- 

 tribution of the sexes in different spikelets on the same individual. They are called homogamous if there be no differ- 

 ence in this respect between any of the spikelets of the same individual, as in Bromus: — heterogamous, if the arrangement, 

 of the sexes be different in different spikelets from the same root, as in Andropogon. Dioecious signifies that there are some 

 spikelets conformably male (whether provided with an accessory neuter floret or not) on one individual, and conformably 

 female on another, as in Gynerium : and monoecious, that male and female spikelets (whether or not they be accompanied 

 by a neuter floret ) are distributed apart from each other, but on the same individual, as in Zea. 



" As to composition. The terms hcmiologamous, hemigamous, and polygamous, serve to indicate the distribution of the 

 sexes among the different florets of the same spikelet. A spikelet is called polygamous, if one of the two florets which it 

 contains be unisexual, and the other bisexual, as in Spodiopogon, and several Panica. A hemiologamous spikelet is 

 that in which one of the two florets is neuter, and the other bisexual, as in several species of Panicum. Hemigamous 

 signifies that a spikelet is composed of one neuter floret and another unisexual, whether male or female, as in Isclue- 

 mum. Spikelets are also called Monoecious in composition, where one of the two florets is male and the other female." — 

 N. von E. 



