Brachiaria.] 
CL VII. GRAMINE^J (Stapf). 
517 
than the valve ; anthers 1 lin. long if present. Upper floret 
oblong, obtuse, white, its sides exposed upwards and vividly con- 
trasting with the purple glumes and the lower valve, very smooth, 
shining ; valve and valvules thinly crustaceous ; anthers 1 lin. 
long. 
Lower Guinea. Angola : Country of the Ganguellas and Ambuellas, 
Gossweiler, 2001 ! 
Mozambique Distr. Mashonaland : Charter District, Mundy ! Col. Herb. 
2107 ! 
Some inflorescences collected by Rogers at Bay a in Katanga, Belgian Congo 
(No. 10387), seem to belong here. 
7. B. falcifera A Stayf. Perennial, up to 2 ft. high from a short 
rhizome with intra vaginal and extra vaginal innovations. Culms 
erect, 3-4-noded, terete or compressed below, simple or sparingly 
branched below, internodes glabrous or more or less stiffly hairy 
below the nodes. Leaf -sheaths rather tight, glabrous or shortly 
ciliate on the outer margin upwards ; ligules a narrow ciliolate 
rim : blades linear from an equally wide or somewhat attenuated 
base, long-tapering to a slender point, 3-10 in. by 1-1 \ lin., hard, 
folded or tightly convolute or flat when old, glabrous, rarely with 
some hairs near the base, midrib keeled, primary lateral nerves about 
3 on each side, only differentiated below, fine. Inflorescence erect, 
secund, of 3-5 almost equally distant oblique straight or arching 
dense secund spike-like racemes ; common axis 2-3 in. long, slender, 
subtriquetrous or compressed, glabrous. Kacemes 2-seriate or 1- 
seriate by the dovetailing of the ranks, 1 J-J in. long, simple, fulvous ; 
rhachis subherbaceous, flat, about | lin. wide, with a prominent 
slender zig-zag midrib, usually more or less finely pubescent on both 
sides, long and densely setulously ciliate along the angles, the cilia 
fulvous, up to 1 J lin. long, internodes about | lin. long : pedicels 
extremely short with subdiscoid tips and a tuft of long yellowish 
hairs. Spikelets contiguous or imbricate, oblong, obtuse or subacute, 
14 lin. long, more or less hairy. Glumes membranous ; lower broadly 
elliptic, very obtuse or subemarginate, rather Arm, glabrous, 9- 
nerved, about two-thirds to four-fifths the length of the spikelet ; 
upper glume corresponding in outline and size to the spikelet, shortly 
and rigidly hairy upwards, 5-nerved with distant cross- veins from 
low down. Lower floret neuter or <$, as long as the spikelet : valve 
similar to the upper glume but hairy on the sides only, with the lateral 
nerves submarginal and the cross-veins confined to the upper part ; 
valvule lanceolate-oblong, subacute, almost as long as the valve. 
Upper floret broad-oblong, minutely mucronulate, 1| lin. long ; 
valve and valvule crustaceous, smooth or very delicately trans- 
versely striate. — Panicum falciferum, Trin. ex Nees, Agrost. Bras. 
117, Gram. Panic. 127, and Sp. Gram. Ic. ii. t. 147 ; Hook. 
Niger FI. 560 ; Steud. Syn. PI. Glum, i, 57 ; Durand & Schinz, 
Consp. FI. Afr. v, 749 (partly), 
