American Grasses Volume 20 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1900 Excerpt: ...1-to 2-flowered, rather broad, compressed, closely imbricated in 2 rows along one side of the rachisof the short spikes; rachilla articulated below the empty glumes. Empty glumes 2, inflated, boat-shaped, obtuse or abruptly pointed, nearly equal; flowering glumes narrow, rather firmer in texture than the empty ones, and acute or mucronate-pointed. Palea hyaline, 2-keeled, nearly as long as the glume. Stamens 3. Styles short, distinct, stigmas plumose. Caryopsis oblong, inclosed within the rigid fruiting glume and palea, free. A rather tall, erect grass, with flat leaves, and a terminal, elongated inflorescence, somewhat resembling that of Panicum colonum. Species 1, northern Europe, Asia, and North America. Fig. 82. Eleusine indica (L.) Gsertn. GOOSE-or YARD-GRASS.--a, Aportion of the axis of a spike bearing 3 spikelets, one of which is terminal; b, a single spikelet; c, a floret; d, the seed. 82. ELEUSINE Gsertn. Fruct. et Sem. I; 7, /. 1. 1788. Spikelets severalflowered, sessile, and closely imbricated in 2 rows along 1 side of a continuous rhachis, which does not project beyond the terminal spikelet; rachilla articulated above the empty glumes. Glumes compressed, keeled, thin, but rigid, obtuse, the 1st 2 and sometimes the uppermost 1 empty. Palea a little shorter than the glume, compressed, bicarinate. Seed finely striated and inclosed within a thin pericarp. Coarse-tufted annuals, with the rather stout unilateral spikes digitate or approximate at the apex of the culm. Species 5 or 6, in tropical and subtropical regions of the Old World. E. coracana is valued in Africa, India, and some other eastern countries asa cereal. The species here illustrated is a common weed in all the warmer countries of the world. Fig. 83. Dactyloctenium aBgyptium (L.) Wllld. ...