INTRODUCTION. 
SYSTEMATIC DESCRIPTION OF THE ORDER GRAMINET. 
Grasses. —Roots tufted and fibrous; large succulent-rooted tussacs, or creeping rhizomes. Culms hollow, 
knotted and closed at the joints, rounded. Leaves alternate, usually distichous, very long or short, sheathing 
part of leaf split longitudinally on one side, with generally a membranous appendage at the summit called a 
ligule. Florets mostly perfect, imbricated on a common axis within a calyx, the latter composed of two or more 
empty glumes, the whole forming a spikelet. Flowers (stamens, pistil, and ovary) enclosed within two glumes, 
the lower (flowering glume) generally keeled with one or more nerves, the upper (palea) two-nerved, rarely one- 
nerved. Perianth probably represented by two to three small scales, situated beneath the ovary. Stamens 
usually three, filaments capillary, anthers attached by the back, versatile. Ovary one-celled, with one erect 
ovule. Styles two, united at the basd, stigmas feathery, with sometimes branched stigmatic hairs. Fruit a 
grain, sometimes adhering to the palea. Seed closely adhering to the pericarp, embryo on one side at the base 
of the albumen, generally pear-shaped. 
A most important order of phaenogamous plants abundantly spread over the surface of the earth, and 
exceeding in number of individuals any other order of plants. The grain of several species form important 
articles of food for man, and the aggregation of species as pasture supplies food for numerous herbivorous animals, 
and in many the fibrous part of their structure also offers an abundance of economic material for the manufac¬ 
ture of various products, such as paper. 
ARRANGEMENT OF THE GENERA ACCORDING TO THE NATURAL SYSTEM. 
Spikelets with 1 fertile terminal flower, with or without a male or imperfect flower below it. 
1. Oryze^e. —Flowering glumes hardening, and enclosing the grain. Empty glumes 4 or 5, unequal, 
laterally compressed, lower smaller.—1. E hr hart a; 2. Microlsena. 
2. RhalaridE/E.—F lowering glume and palea hardening, and enclosing the grain. Empty glumes 2, equal, 
laterally compressed, keeled, longer than the flowering.—3. Alopecurus ; 4. Hierochloe. 
3. Panice.e. —Flowering glume and palea hardening, and enclosing the grain. Empty glumes 2-4, outer 
smaller, often dorsally compressed.—5. Spinifex; 6. Paspalum; 7. Panicum; 8. Isachne. 
4. Andropogonea:. —Flowering glume small, thin, transparent, or 0. —9. Zoysia. 
Spikelets with 1 or more perfect flowers, the male or imperfect flowers, if present, above the perfect ones, the axis or rachis 
often ending in a point or bristle. 
5. Agrostide.e. —Spikelets, 1-flowered. Flowering glume, awnless, or with a simple awn, grain free.— 
10. Ecliinopogon ; 11. Dichelachne ; 12. Apera ; 13. Sporobolus; 14. Agrostis ; 14". Deyeuxia. 
6. Stipaceas. —Spikelets, 1-flowered. Flowering glume firm, with a simple or 3-cleft awn jointed on to its 
tip, closely enveloping the grain.—12". Stipa. 
7. Aruxdine/E. —Spikelets usually 2- or more-flowered, rachis with long silky hairs. Glumes all membranous, 
free.—15. Arunclo. 
8. AvENACEiE.—Spikelets 2- or more-flowered. Flowering glumes on a slender rachis, usually shorter 
than the empty ones, membranous, shining, split at the top with an intermediate awn that is often twisted 
at the base (rarely awnless).—“16. Dantlionia; 17. Deschampsia; 18. Koeleria; 19. Trisetum. 
9. Festucacea?. —Spikelets usually 4- or more-flowered. Flowering glumes usually longer than the empty 
ones, on a flexuous rachis.—20. Glyceria; 21. Catabrosa; 22. Poa; 23. Festuca; 24. Bromus. 
10. Hordeacea:. —Spikelets, 1- or more-flowered (spiked), sessile on opposite sides of a simple rachis, 
solitary or 2 or 3 together, the glumes standing right and left to the axis of the spike. — 25. Triticum; 
26. Gymnostichum. 
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