ENGLISH BOTANY. 
ORDER LXXXVIIL— GRAMINA. 
Annual or perennial herbs, rarely shrubs or trees, with tufted or 
creeping soboliferous rhizomes. Stem cylindrical or 2 -edged, com- 
monly hollow except at the nodes, simple or branched. Leaves 
alternate, distichous, sheathing, with the sheath almost always split to 
the base, or rarely only at the apex, generally with a small prominent 
scale {ligule) at the apex of the sheath, between the stem and the 
lamina; lamina usually linear, rarely lanceolate, with parallel vena- 
tion. Flowers perfect or unisexual, and in that case monoecious, very 
rarely dioecious or polygamous, in spikelets arranged in panicles, 
spikes, or compound spikes; the part of the stem passing through 
the inflorescence is termed the rachis. Glumes 2 at the base of the 
spikelet, rarely solitary or absent. Florets in the spikelets, when 
more than 1, arranged on an axis^ bifarious, each enclosed between 
2 glumelles (pales) or scarious bracts, generally resembling the 
glumes, but the inner one usually smaller and sometimes absent ; 
glumes and pales frequently with the midrib excurrent, forming an 
awn. Perianth none, or represented by 2 minute hypogynous scales 
{lodicules). Stamens 3, rarely 1, 2, or 6 ; filaments filiform ; anthers 
affixed by the back, versatile. Ovary solitary, fi-ee from the perianth, 
1 -celled, 1-ovuled. Styles 2, rarely united to the base, very rarely 1, 
each style or branch terminating in a stigma, which is often plumose. 
Fruit a grain (cariops), free or adhering to the pales, in the former 
case, however, usually enveloped in them, oblong-cylindrical or oblong- 
ovoid, or subglobose, more or less compressed. Pericarp chartaceous, 
rart'ly cru>taceous. Seed with the testa adhering to the pericarp; 
albumen copious, farinaceous; embiyo minute, at the base of the 
albumen on the upper side. 
