/ ö O
[ i o 76 ]
P H L E U M pratenfe.
Common C a f s-iail-grafs.
TRIANDRIA Digynia.
G en. C har, Cal. tw o -v a lv ed , abrupt, p ointed , fe lflle ,
lo n g e r than t)ie co ro lla , tin g le - flow e red .
S pec. Char. S p ik e c y lin d r ic a l, v e ry lo n g . G lum e s
fr in g ed at th e b a c k , lo n g e r than th e awns.
,5 y n . P b le um p ratenfe. Linn. Sp. PI. 87. Sm. FI.
Brit. 68. Hudf. 25. With. 1 17 . Hull. 16.
Relh. ^3. ed. 2. 24, Sibth. 34. Abbot. 13.
Mart. F l. Ruß. t. 5,
G ram e p typh inum majus et minus. Raii Syn. 398.
C O M M O N every where in meadows, paftures and wafte
ground, where its fpikes may be found from June to October.
The root is perennial, jointed, and more or lefs creeping. Stems
$}re£t, 3 or 4 feet in height, leafy, except in the upper part,
ftriated. Leaves flat, tapering to a point, roughilh to the touch,
with long, ftriated, cylindrical (heaths, crowned by a (hort,
blunt ftipula. Spike folitary, upright, cylindrical, obtufe, com-
pofed pf innupaerable clofely-crowded flowers, and varying from
2 to 4 pr 3 inches in length. The calyx-valves are green, or
purplifti, with pale nerves, and a dilated, white, membranous
margin, their keel fringed, their awns fhort and a little fpread-
ing. The corolla is fibbed with green. The anthene hang
loofely out of the flower, and are mod commonly purple. In
fituations occafiopally Jried up, eyery part of the herb is fmaller,
and the joints of the root become fwelled and very fucculent.
In this ftate it is the Pbleum nodofum of Linnaeus and other
authors.
Profeflor Martyn has fufficiently ftiown the inutility of this
grafs to agriculturifts : by his account, it appears to have been
celebrated formerly on very flight grounds,