CHAP. II. 
BRACTS. 
1'25 
spadix, large coloured bracts, in wliicli the spadix, during 
aestivation, is wholly enwrapped, and which may perhaps per- 
form in those plants the office of corolla. This is called the 
spathe (Jig. 85.). Link considers it a modification of the 
petiole! [Elementa^ p. 253.) 
68 
The most remarkable arrangement of bracts takes place 
in Grasses, in which they occupy the place of calyx and 
corolla, and have received a great variety of names from 
different systematic writers. In order to explain distinctly 
the application of these terms, I must describe w^ith some 
minuteness the structure of a locusta or spikelet, as the partial 
inflorescence of Grasses is denominated. Take, for example, 
any common Bromus; each spikelet will be seen to have at its 
base two opposite empty bracts [Jig, 68. i), one of which is 
attached to the rachis a little above the base of the other : 
these are the glumes of Linnaeus and most botanists, the gluma 
exterior or calycinalis of some writers, the tegmen of Palisot 
de Beauvois, the lepicena of Richard, the ccBtonium of Trinius, 
and, finally, the peristachyum of Panzer. Above the glumes are 
several florets sitting in denticulations of the rachis (fig, 68. c) : 
each of these consists of one bract, with the midrib quitting 
the blade a little below the apex, and elongated into a bristle 
called the aim, heard, or arista, and of another bract facing 
the first, with its back to the rachis, bifid at the apex, with no 
dorsal vein, but with its edges inflexed, and a rib on each side 
at the line of inflexion (fig, 68. a). These bracts are the 
corolla of Linnaeus, the calyx of Jussieu, the perianthium of 
