Exotheca.'] 
CLVII. GRAMINEAS (Stapf). 
385 
2- or 3-noded and simple below the lowest flowering branch, terete 
or the lowest internodes more or less compressed, glabrous. Leaf- 
s heaths terete or those of the innovations compressed and keeled, 
produced at the mouth into firm lanceolate to subulate acute auricles 
up to 10 lin. long, glabrous, smooth, the basal more or less persistent ; 
ligules s carious, truncate, glabrous, adnate to the auricles of the 
sheath ; blades narrowly linear from a gradually attenuated base, 
tapering to a long fine point, up to 1 (sometimes almost 1J) ft. by 
1-2 lin., folded or those of the culm-leaves flat, firm, pale to glaucous 
green, glabrous, rarely hairy, particularly towards the base, rough 
upwards on the face and along the margins. Inflorescence, if not 
reduced to a single raceme-pair, with all the internodes much elon- 
gated, the lowest up to over J ft. long ; simple flowering branches 
and the rays of the 2-3-rayed tiers erect, slender ; lowest subtending 
leaf of robust specimens resembling the preceding leaf, the follow- 
ing with spathaceous sheaths and much reduced blades, always 
glabrous. Spatheoles narrow, acute to finely acuminate, 3-5 in. 
long, subherbaceous to almost scarious, early and tightly inrolled ; 
peduncles strict, ultimately long-exserted from the spatheole, 
glabrous, scaberulous upwards and disarticulating at the slightly 
widened tips. Racemes about 1 in. long, greenish, mostly tinged 
with purple or violet, glabrous (except the upper pedicels), the upper 
with a bare filiform glabrous scaberulous base, 7-13 lin. long ; both 
bases with upwards widened obliquely truncate tips ; the very 
short joints glabrous or with a few rufous cilia; pedicels up to 3J 
lin. long, cilia rufous. Fertile spikelet about 7 lin. long, including 
the callus, pale or greenish, the beak darker, at length more or less 
brown ; callus 2 lin. long, beard dense, short, silky, fulvous to rufous. 
Lower glume densely pubescent at the base, loosely so or glabrescent 
to glabrous upwards, 9-nerved, nerves very slender when seen from 
the inner side, but widened into obtuse more or less distinct ribs 
on the back, the 3 intracarinal of the beak prominent and scabrid 
like the keels ; upper glume obtuse or deltoid-truncate, pubescent 
or glabrous. Lower floret : valve oblong, obtuse, 6-7 lin. long, 
faintly 2-3-nerved. Upper floret ^ : valve linear, oblong, carti- 
laginous from a narrowed hyaline base, 3J lin. long with narrow 
hyaline margins and linear -lanceolate densely ciliate lobes, not much 
over ! lin. long ; awn stout, 2J-d in. long, fulvous, column longer 
than the bristle, fulvously hirtellous ; valvule obovate, long-ciliate, 
over 1 lin. long. Anthers 2 lin. long. Pedicelled spikelets lanceolate- 
oblong, 7-8 lin. long, glabrous ; lower glume about 15-nerved, 
one side with a marginal nerve, the other with a very narrow wing 
and still narrower inflexed flap, both sides (particularly the winged) 
more or less involute, terminal bristle up to over 2 lin. long ; 
upper glume lanceolate, acute, slightly shorter, 3-nerved, ciliate ; 
valves hyaline, ciliate, lower oblong, 3-nerved, 5-5-J lin. long ; 
upper linear-oblong, narrowed downwards, 1-neived, under 5 lin. 
EL. TROP. APR. VOL. IX. PT. 3. 2 C 
