The racemes are usually two, erect, fragile, 1 to 3 inches long with a slight thickening of the peduncle below the inflorescence; the joints are 1/3 to 2/3 as long as the sessile spikelets; trigonous and subclavate, and with long hairs on one side. The _spikelets_ are linear-oblong, glabrous or villous, 1/8 to 1/4 inch long, sessile and stalked spikelets close together; the pedicel of the stalked spikelet is thick about 1/3 or less than the length of the sessile spikelet, ciliate on one side, confluent with the thick callus of the sessile spikelet, which is sparsely bristly. The _sessile spikelet_ consists of four glumes and is awned. The _first glume_ is concave, pale yellow, shining and cartilaginous to about 2/3 its length from the base, and the upper third is membranous, dimidiately ovate; at the back in the cartilaginous portion, there are three to six deep convex smooth ridges running across the glume; the membranous tip is thin and with anastomosing green veins; the margins of this glume are thick, narrowly incurved, ciliolate, and with a narrow wing on the outer margin. The _second glume_ is oblong-lanceolate or lanceolate, coriaceous, acuminate, scaberulous, keeled and laterally compressed and on the keel just below the tip there is a narrow ciliate wing. The _third glume_ is ovate-lanceolate, hyaline, acuminate 1- to 3-veined, male or empty, with a narrow hyaline palea. The _fourth glume_ is shorter than the third, deeply cleft into two lanceolate acute lobes, 3-veined at the base; awn up to about 2/3 inch long; _palea_ is linear lanceolate. Stamens are three and _lodicules_ are small and cuneate. The pedicelled spikelet is very variable. It is shorter than the sessile, with obscure transverse ridges and may consist of four glumes, but without an awn to the fourth glume; sometimes this spikelet is reduced to a single glume. The grain is broadly oblong, brownish and compressed. _Distribution._--Throughout India and Ceylon. [Illustration: Fig. 133.--Ischaemum pilosum. A and B. Ligules.] =Ischaemum pilosum, _Hack._= It is a tall, robust, perennial grass with rhizomes producing numerous creeping stolons densely covered with scaly-sheaths. The aerial stems are erect, freely branching at the base, slender, 2 to 3 feet long, glabrous. The _leaf-sheath_ is glabrous. The _ligule_ is a distinct glabrous membrane, 1/8 inch long, rounded. _Nodes_ are glabrous. The _leaf-blade_ is linear, finely acuminate, glabrous but bearded at the base, 6 to 12 inches long and 1/8 to 1/3 inch broad. The _inflorescence_ consists of two to six softly hairy spikes which are yellow or brown 1 to 4 inches long. Joints and pedicels are slender, sparsely ciliate. [Illustration: Fig. 134.--Ischaemum pilosum.