folia, Sind. Hort. Gram. Wob. p. 347 ; also aristata, p. 340 . — Vilfa alba. Gray’* 
Nat. Arr. v. ii p. 145. — Gramen miliacamm majus, paniculd spadiced, n. 11 ; 
and also paniculi viridi, n. 12. Dill, in Ray’s Syn. p. 404. 
Localities. — In moist meadows and fields ; common. 
Perennial. — Flowers in July and August. 
Root fibrous. Culms (stems) 2 or 3 feet long, decumbent, more 
or less branched, smooth, striated, leafy, sending out roots from 
the lower joints. Leaves flat, broad, taper-pointed, ribbed, very 
rough, especially at the edges. Sheaths long, striated, smooth, oc- 
casionally rough, entirely divided. Stipula ( ligula ) oblong, blunt, 
torn. Panicle from 2 to 6 inches, or more, long, rather contracted, 
especially before flowering, its branches spreading, unequal, waved, 
rough, pale green or purplish. Calyx-glumes nearly equal, spear- 
shaped, smooth, except on the keel. Corolla of 2 unequal, pale, 
thin, membranous palece, the anther of which is largest, and has 
5 nerves, and as many teeth ; the inner is smaller, and only faintly 
2- or 3-nerved at the base, with a blunt, nearly entire point. Styles 
very short, Stigmas thick and feathery. 
When the culms become more extensively creeping, and the 
branches of the panicle densely tufted, it is then the Agrostis 
stolonifera of Linnajus, and also of Engl. Bot t. 1532; Mart. FI. 
Rust. t. 120 ; Knapp’s Gram. Brit. t. 27. and 1. 1 16. ; and Loudon’s 
Encyclopaedia of Agriculture, p. 892. par. 5687. It is also the 
Agrostis alba of Leers’ FI. Herborn. p. 21. t. 4. f. 5.; and the 
Gramen caninum supinum, or Upright Dog's-grass, of Johnson’s 
edition of Gerarde’s Herbal, p. 26. f. 1. 
This variety of Agrostis alba is considered to be the same with 
the Fiorin-grass of Dr. Richardson, and the Irish Agriculturists, 
but it has never been cultivated to any extent in this country, 
though in Ireland its produce, on moist peat soils, and bogs, is said 
to be very great. Dr. Richardson, who first brought this grass 
into notice, (in 1809,) considered it to be superior to all other 
grasses, and wrote several pamphlets to recommend its cultivation. 
In those pamphlets many experiments are detailed, tending to 
prove that Fiorin-grass produces hay preferred by cattle to all 
other, and near treble the quantity afforded by any other grass ; 
that this enormous produce is not the exhausting effect of a single 
year, but the regular crop to be expected ; that this succulent grass 
is equally serviceable for Winter green food; that it is, in a great 
degree, indifferent to the extremes of wet or draught, and perfectly 
insensible to the severities of cold ; and that its universality of 
growth is most remarkable. It abounds in morasses and moors 
where other grasses cannot contend with it, on thin dry soil as well 
as wet, extending up the bleakest mountains of our harsh climates, 
and therefore appears particularly suitable to unproductive, exten- 
sive tracts. (See Withering’s Arrangement of Brit. Plants, 7ih 
edit. v. ii. p. 158). On dry soils this grass is said to be worth 
nothing. Tea has been made from fiorin , and found useful in rear- 
ing calves, being mixed with oatmeal and skimmed milk. 
Much information relating to this Grass may be found in the “ Letters and Papers 
of the Bath and West of England Agricultural Society,” v.xiii p. 1 — 53; Curtis’s 
“ Observations on the British Grasses, 5th ed. p. 91 — 98 ; Dutton’s “ Agricultural 
Survey of the County of Galway,” p. 128 — 134 ; and Loudon’s ‘'Encyclopaedia 
of Agriculture,” p. 892. 
