324 xii. graminEjE. [Panicum. 
Middle Island: Canterbury, Lyall. Probably a form of some common Indian Grass; it 
is also found in Australia and the South Sea Islands. 
The following grasses, allied to Panicum , are introduced as doubtful denizens. 
Panicum ( Digitaria ) sanguiuale, Linn., an annual, prostrate or erect grass, with more or 
less hairy leaves ; panicle of 6-8, very slender, almost digitate, strict branches, 2-4 in. long ; 
spikelets in pairs on one side of the branches, minute, 1 sessile, the other pedicelled; lowest 
glume very minute, 2nd concave, shorter than the 3rd, which is flat and 5-nerved. 
P. colonum, Linn., one of the commonest of Australian and tropical grasses, has erect 
culms, 1-2 ft. high ; leaves flat, glabrous ; panicle of 6-10 short, curved, ascending, alternate, 
flat branches; spikelets green, crowded in 2-4 rows ou one side of the brauchlets; glumes 
hispid ; outer, broad, short ; 2 following, flat, acute or cuspidate. 
P. gibbosum, Br., is indicated by Raoul as a New Zealand plaut, but I suspect some mis- 
take; it is a slender tropical Australian grass, with a solitary filiform spike, and bearded 
glumes, the flowering one gibbous. 
P. glaucnm, Linn., an excessively common, tropical, and temperate annual weed, has an 
ovoid panicle like Echinopogon , with many rough bristles on the pedicels of the spikelets, and 
the flowering glume wrinkled. 
8. ISACHNE, Br. . 
Tufted grasses. Leaves generally flat ; mouth of the sheath bearded.— 
Spikelets panicled, short, ovoid, 2-flowered, lower flower usually male, upper 
hermaphrodite. Empty glumes 2, nearly equal, often deciduous ; flowering 
2, nearly equal, hardening and surrounding the pale and grain. Pale nearly 
as large as the glumes, 2-nerved, also hardening. Scales 2, truncate. Sta- 
mens 3. Grain free within the hardened glumes and pale. 
A small tropical and subtropical genus, common in Australia, but not extending into 
Tasmania. 
1. I. australis, Br. ; — FI. N. Z. i. 291. Culms, 6-18 in. high, rather 
slender, decumbent and creeping at the base. Leaves scaberulous, 3-5 in. 
long, g- broad, flat. Panicle erect, ovoid, 1-2 in. long, lax ; branches long, 
flexuous, sparingly divided. Spikelets few, pedicelled, obtuse, in. long ; 
pedicels with a pellucid gland. Empty glumes glabrous ; lower flowering- 
sessile, glabrous; upper stipitate, pubescent. — ? Banic am gonatodes, Steudel. 
Northern Island : Bay of Islands, A. Cunningham; Auckland, Sinclair; Lake Taupo, 
Colenso. Common in Australia, India, and China. 
9. ZOYSIA, Willdenow. 
Small, creeping, usually littoral grasses, with rigid, running rhizomes. 
Leaves distichous, grooved or involute, filiform. — Spikelets few (1-10), ses- 
sile or shortly pedicelled, alternate and imbricating, on a stiff, erect, flattened 
flexuous rhackis. Empty glume 1, ovoid, terete, convolute, rigid, very coria- 
ceous, glabrous, even, obtuse mucronate or awned ; flowering glume solitary, 
sessile, included, membranous, convolute. Pale membranous or 0. Stamens 
3. Grain free. 
The genus consists of one variable species, common on the shores of the Indian, Aus- 
tralian, and Chinese seas, sometimes attaining 1 ft. high, with a compound spike. 
1. 2L pungens, W'dld. ; — FI. N. Z. i. 312. Culms 1-2 in. high, tufted, 
quite glabrous. Leaves spreading, filiform or subulate, involute, 1-3 in. long ; 
sheaths tumid, grooved ; ligtde 0. Spike | in. long, often reduced to a soli- 
tary erect spikelet. Spikelets t L— i in. long. Glume ovoid or more elongated, 
