158 
TRIANDRIA. DIGYNIA. Holcus, 
HOI/CUS.* (One Floret barren : Bloss. awned : Seed enveloped 
with the hardened blossom; Calyx keeled. Sm. E.) 
H. LAna'tus. (Husks two-flowereck woolly; lower floret perfect; awn¬ 
less: upper floret with a recurved awn inclosed in the calyx: 
leaves downy on both sides; root fibrous. E.) 
Gram. Pasc. — Dicks. H. S. — Curt. 228 —( Hort. Gram. — E. Bot. 1169 — FI. 
Dan. 1181. E.) — Schreb. 20. 1 — Leers 7. 6—J. B. ii. 466. 3— Sclieuch. 4. 
24. A. B. — Park. 1155. 1 — Anders. 
(Whole plant of a velvety softness. Barren Jloret containing a pistil. 
Germen similar to that of the fertile floret; but much smaller. Styles 
only found in the second crop, and that the first principally consists of Poa trivialis 
palustris. See vol. i. ii. of the Memoirs of Bath Agr. Soc. (Though a strong prejudice 
has deservedly existed against this grass among farmers and agriculturists, its utility in 
some cases has been powerfully advocated. Poa trivialis reptans and A. stolonifera have 
been much confounded with each other, probably from their similarity of general cha¬ 
racter, and frequently growing intermixed, though there can be no reason to doubt the 
latter being the real Fiorin (butter) grass of the Irish: ( Meus-wellt rhedegog , in Wales. 
Tor various particulars we would refer to Gent. Mag. and Monthly Mag. for 1809 and 
1810 ; to Young’s Annals of Agriculture for 1794. vol. 22., and especially to an Essay 
by the Rev. Dr. Richardson of Clonfecle, in which many experiments are detailed 
tending to prove that Fiorin Gi'ass produces hay preferred by cattle to all other, and 
nearly treble the quantity afforded by any other grass ; that this enormous produce is 
not the exhausting effort of a single year, but the regular crop to be expected; that an 
English acre of meadow yielded in 1808 above 16,000 pounds weight, and the same 
extent of another meadow in 1809 produced 18,000 pounds of choice hay: that this 
grass is equally serviceable for winter green food, by which succulent provender milch 
cows may be well supported from December until late in April; that by the transmissals 
of Dr. Richardson, it is already under cultivation in many places, both in England and 
Scotland; that the slightest catch of the ground is sufficient for its existence and nou¬ 
rishment ; that it is in a great degree indifferent to the extremes of wet and drought, 
and is found in health at all altitudes; that it is perfectly insensible to the severities of 
cold, that it can bear great privations both of air and sun, and that its universality of 
growth is most remarkable. It abounds in morasses and moors where other grasses 
cannot contend with it, on thin dry soil as well as wet, extending up the bleakest 
mountains of our harsh climates, and therefore appears particularly suitable to such un¬ 
productive and extensive tracts as Dartmoor, Exmoor, and others in England, the high¬ 
lands of Scotland, the sterile wastes of Wales, or the bogs of Ireland. Mr. Sinclair 
considers var. latifolia, the Irish Fiorin, as by far the most valuable sort. He states, 
“ the chief advantage of this grass, in permanent pasture, is its late growth. It remains 
in a degree inactive till other grasses have attained to perfection, and when their pro¬ 
ductive powers become exhausted, those of Fiorin begin ; and it will be found that the 
latest mouthful of herbage, and sometimes the earliest in those pastures, is principally 
afforded by this grass.” On a comparison of the produce of Fiorin with that of cocks¬ 
foot grass ( Dactylis glomerata ), meadow fescue ( Fastuca pratonsis ), and meadow 
foxtail ( Alopecurus pratensis ), it will appear inferior to the two former species, and 
superior to the latter. Hort. Gram. Nevertheless, expectation has been too highly 
excited, and we learn that Lord Rous, at Henham-hall, has relinquished the culti¬ 
vation of Fiorin. Of varieties produced by local circumstances, Mr. Sinclair dis¬ 
criminates latifolia, angustifolia, aristata, nemoralis, and palustris. Of the three former, 
representations are given in Hort. Gram., the first and second being most productive, 
the others ve^ inferior grasses or noxious weeds. Whether the permanency of each 
may be considered fully established remains questionable. Holdich has a var. angust¬ 
ifolia called surface squitch, or red robin, by farmers, and to be destroyed by drill 
husbandry. E.) 
•f* (OXxof of the Greeks: a kind of wild barley ; but the meaning of the term has 
never been satisfactorily explained. E.) Holcus , Pliny. 
