704 
On  Sweet  Vernal  Grass  and  Golden  Oat  Grass, 
its  extensive  presence  in  mixtures  for  laying  down  new  pastures 
and  improving  old  ones,  has  led  to  its  appearance  over  the 
country  in  such  a way  as  to  puzzle  botanists,  and  to  lead  to  the 
notion  that  it  is  an  indigenous  grass,  which  had  been  over- 
looked until  a few  years  ago.  It  was  first  noticed  by  Mr.  Britten 
in  1872,  at  Mobberly  in  Cheshire,  in  a field  which  had  been 
broken  up  and  re-sown  with  grass  some  years  before.  It  was 
next  observed  by  Mr.  Townsend,  in  1874,  in  a gravelly  field 
near  Netley,  in  Hampshire  ; and  since  then  it  has  been 
Fig.  2. — Sweet  Scented  Vernal  Grass,  Anthoxanthum  odoratum,  Linn.  Ten  times  the  natural  size. 
a,  The  seed  with  its  shining  striated  scales;  b,  one  of  the  hairy  pales,  with  the  jointed  hygro- 
metric  awn,  covered  with  hairs,  and  with  curved  edges,  and  an  even  apex  ; c,  the  “seed”  a« 
offered  for  sale,  consisting  of  the  two  pales  surrounding  the  small  shining  seed,  which  is  6een 
between  the  open  edges  of  the  pales. 
recorded  from  Staffordshire,  Worcestershire,  Devonshire,  and 
other  places.  But  in  none  of  the  localities  is  its  appearance 
free  from  the  strong  suspicion  that  it  has  been  introduced  with 
agricultural  seeds.  Mr.  Townsend  gave  a figure  and  descrip- 
tion of  the  plant  in  the  ‘Journal  of  Botany’  for  1875,  page  1, 
plate  157. 
The  seeds  of  the  two  grasses  very  closely  resemble  each  other, 
yet  they  possess  differences  which  may  be  detected  when  they 
ure  carefully  examined. 
