This grass is a variable one. There is much variation in the breadth of the leaves and in the markings and hairiness of the spikelets. The spikelets may be glabrous or hairy and the marking in the first glume of the sessile spikelets varies in the matter of marginal nodules--it may have mere shallow notches or deep well-formed nodules and there may be transverse ridges or they may be absent. This grass is abundant on the West Coast and rare in the East Coast. _Distribution._--Throughout the plains and lower hills of India and Ceylon. [Illustration: Fig. 131.--Ischaemum aristatum. A. A portion of the raceme showing the joints; B. a sessile and a pedicelled spikelet. 1, 2, 3 and 6. the first, second, third and the fourth glume, respectively; 4 and 5. palea of the third and the fourth glume; 7. ovary and lodicules; 8. first glume of the pedicelled spikelets.] =Ischaemum rugosum, _Salisb._= This is an erect annual grass with tufted, leafy, compressed stems varying in length from 10 inches to 2 feet. The _leaf-sheath_ is glabrous, loose and compressed, with a membranous auricle confluent with the truncate _ligule_. _Nodes_ usually glabrous but sometimes also puberulous. The _leaf-blade_ is narrow, linear-lanceolate, flat, base contracted, flaccid, acuminate, rounded at the base, glabrous or sparsely hairy on both the surfaces; the topmost leaf is often reduced to an inflated sheath enclosing the inflorescence partially. [Illustration: Fig. 132.--Ischaemum rugosum. 1. A part of the raceme showing sessile spikelets with reduced pedicelled spikelets; 2. a sessile spikelet and a well developed pedicelled spikelet; 3. a reduced pedicelled spikelet; 4, 5, 6 and 8. the first, second, third and the fourth glume of the sessile spikelet; 7 and 9. palea of the third and fourth glumes of the sessile spikelet; 10. ovary.]