NEW OR NOTEWORTHY AMERICAN GRASSES ERIANTHUS TRACYI Culms stout, erect, 2-4 m. high, smooth and glabrous, the nodes upwardly barbed with deciduous silky hairs, about I cm. long ; sheaths closely embracing the culm, shorter than the inter nodes, smooth, glabrous, except at the apex, where they are pubes cent with deciduous, long, silky, appressed hairs ; ligule rounded, about 5 mm. long ; leaves 5 dm. long or more, 1.5-3 cm. broad, narrowed toward the base, long-acuminate toward the apex, strongly scabrous on both surfaces, pilose on the upper side toward the base ; panicle oblong, 3-5 dm. long, 8-12 cm. wide, cream white, dense, the main axis and branches pubescent with long ap pressed silky hairs, the branches usually in 2's, much divided, ascending or nearly erect, 15 cm. long or less ; spikelets lanceo late, 5-6 mm. long, about one-half again as long as the internodes, yellowish brown, usually marked with red, less than one-half the length of the involucral hairs ; first and second scales firm-mem branous, the former a little the longer, both pubescent with silky hairs, twice the length of the scales, the first acuminate, faintly 7-nerved at the base, 2-toothed and prominently 2-nerved at the apex, the two nerves scabrous, the second scale acute, the nerves hardly discernible ; third and fourth scales hyaline, shorter than the first and second ones, ciliate on the margins, the third acute, 1-nerved, the fourth narrower, acuminate, 2-toothed, conspicuously t-nerved, the nerve excurrent as a straight or slightly twisted (not spiral) awn, 1.5-2 cm. long.
Type collected at Starkville, Miss., on October 1, 1896, by Prof. S. M. Tracy, in whose honor I take pleasure in naming it. C. L. Pollard's no. 1,341, collected at the same locality, in August of the past year, is the same. Mr. Pollard informs me that it grows on moist open slopes.
The larger and denser panicle, the longer hairs both on the outer scales and at the base of the spikelet, and the longer awn, which is straight or nearly so (not coiled), readily separate it from E. alopecureia'es L. The base of the awn in E. Tracyi, that portion included in the outer scales, is loosely twisted, while the same por tion in E. alopecitro&cs is closely coiled.
At the present time I only have specimens from Mississippi, and would be exceedingly glad to receive more material from other localities.