TRITICUM l o l ia c e um . f Eng. Botany.
I P o a l o l ia c e a , Flora Ang.
Sea Rye-grass.
Sexe. Chah. Spicnlæ, with several florets, sitting upon opposite sides of a rigid serpentine
spike stalk.
T h is rigid little plant inhabits the dry sandy cliffs of many of our sea shores, but not universally!
It bears a certain resemblance to Poa rigida, but that plant is invariably branched, and doubly branched
in the lower part of the panicle; a circumstance that will readily distinguish it from the Sea Rye-grass: *
spicula; alternate on the rachis; ovate, with five, or lanceolate, with twenty florets; the straw is thick,
shining, and coloured towards the maturity of the seed..------Mr. Hudson did not sufliciently attend to
the characteristics of this plant when he arranged it with the Pom, as: the sessile spiculm, upon an
unbranched spike, obviously mark its station with the genus Triticum.-------- This little grass exists
without having any apparent utility attached to it; the scanty foliage, rigid straw, and puny stature,
render it unsuitable for animal food, and its feeble fibrous roots are not adapted to fix and render
stationary the particular habitation it delights in.
When secondary causes are the objects o f our enquiry, there are few subjects that so completely
baffle our investigations as the smaller race o f plants, which seem too insignificant to fill any important
scale within the range o f our comprehension.
They float no perfume on the zephyr’s wing,
Nor with their glowing vestments court the eyes
Of man, but in their lowly ranks fulfil
The purpos’d ends of their creation.—
The mighty hand that robed aspiring
Lebanon with Cedar’s massy pride, spread *
O’er Judea’s arid wastes the tow’ring
Palm, and shaded favour'd Britain with her
Guardian Oak—form’d them, important to
Connect his universal chain.
A, the valves of the Calyx.
B, the Corolla.
• This Triticum however, in certain eituatione, approaches still nearer P. rigida, but yet the spiral* are invariably
sitting. Fig.; IS an instance of the singular transformations that plants undergo, and in this variety we with some diffi-
culty trace the original humble Triticum loliaceum.