Eremopogon.] clvii. geamine^: (Stapf). 
183 
reduced to an empty valve, the upper 5 ; 1 (the lower) in the pedi- 
« celled spikelets <£ or neuter, the upper quite suppressed, or both 
suppressed. Sessile spikelet dorsally compressed, awned ; callus 
small, shortly bearded. Glumes equal, thinly chartaceous to mem- 
branous, lower 2-keeled, with narrow inflexed margins, upper boat- 
shaped, 3-nerved, acutely keeled. Valve of lower floret hyaline, 
nerveless, of upper floret reduced to a hyaline upwards firmer linear 
stipe passing into a slender awn. Stamens 3. Stigmas exserted 
laterally near the middle of the spikelet, longer than the styles. 
Grain unknown. Pedicelled spikelet awnless ; valve if present 
hyaline, nerveless. — Perennial, rarely annual, grasses with slender 
culms simple below, more or less branched above, the branches often 
gathered in fastigiate bundles, each supported by a bladeless sheath 
and terminated by a solitary raceme. Spikelets small. 
Species about 4, in tta^o^ical and warm- temperate parts of the Old World. 
1. E. foveolatus^ Stapf. Perennial, densely tufted from short 
and much branched rhizomes. Culms very slender, \ to almost 2 ft. 
high, geniculate at the base, rarely quite erect, about 3-noded and 
usually simple below the flowering branches, terete, glabrous below 
the bearded nodes, sometimes scaberulous or puberulous. Basal 
leaf-sheaths short, broad, whitish, thin, more or less silky, those of 
the culms terete, glabrous except at the nodes, pale green, slightly 
scaberulous ; ligules hyaline, rounded, ciliolate, J lin. long, con- 
tinued into the sheath-margins ; blades linear, acute, 1-3 in. long 
and J-l lin. wide, tightly folded or at length more or less flat, glau- 
cous, pruinose to minutely puberulous on both sides, margin carti- 
laginous, smooth or nearly so, generally with a few cilia near the base, 
midrib keeled below, primary lateral nerves 2 on each side. Flower- 
ing branches solitary or fascicled, slender, simple, sometimes flexuous 
or geniculately ascending, more or less fastigiate ; spathes very 
narrow, acute, 1 J to over 2 in. long, scaberulous ; peduncles filiform, 
at length exserted from the spathe, puberulous above, tips hardly 
thickened. Racemes slender, dense, 1-1J in. long, erect or nodding, 
somewhat silky ; joints and pedicels filiform, disarticulating obliquely 
with a short ovate transparent appendage about j lin. long, 
densely ciliate along the margins, the uppermost cilia up to over 1 lin. 
long. Sessile spikelet lanceolate, including the short callus, the 
beard of which reaches more or less up to the middle of the spikelet, 
2 lin. long, pale and shining with reddish tips. Glumes equal, sub- 
chart aceous to almost membranous, glabrous ; the lower minutely 
2-toothed or subentire and minutely truncate, slightly concave on 
the back, inflexed margins narrow, forming scaberulous keels up- 
wards, intracarinal nerves 2, with a circular pit between them above 
the middle ; upper glume oblong, obtuse, semimucronulate, broadly 
rounded on the back, 3-nerved, ciliolate. Lower floret reduced to a 
linear-oblong hyaline very sparingly ciliolate nerveless valve, not 
