Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 2).djvu/619

than the internodes, hispid with bulbous-based hairs ; ligule very short, membranous, densely ciliate. Racemes ¼-l in. long, resembling a string of minute beads, solitary or seemingly fascicled in the axils of the leaves, but individually from shortened axillary branches. Sessile spikelets 1/16-1/12 in. long, subglobose ; callus tumid, glabrous. Glumes 4 ; lower invol-gume irregularly foveolate on the back ; upper invol. -glume closing the cavity of the lower floral glume, elliptic-oblong, obtuse, 1-nerved ; lower floral glume hyaline, shorter than the upper invol. -glume ; upper floral glume about equalling the lower, broadly ovate, obtuse ; palea similar but a little shorter. Pedicellate spikelets equal in length to the sessile or longer, of 2 equal green glumes about 1/10 in. long ; lower invol.-glume broadly ovate or suborbicular, obtuse or subacute, 5-7 nerved, one margin narrowly folded, the other with a hyaline wing, upper invlo.-glume boat-shaped, laterally compressed, the keel with a dorsal byaline ciliolate wing (Cooke).

Uses : — In Behar, it is prescribed internally in conjunction with a little sweet oil, in cases of enlarged spleen and liver (Ainslie}

Syn. :— A. muricatus, Retz. Roxb. 89.

Sans : — Usir.

Vern. :— Khas, bena, panni, senth, ganrar, onei, Bâle-ke-ghâns (H.); Khas-khas, (B.) ; Panni (Pb.); Sirom (Sant.) ; Vâls (Guz.) ; Lâvancha (Kan.) ; Vettiver ; romanchamver (Mal.) ; Vette-ver, (Tam.); Vâlâ, khasakhasa, (Mar.) ; Kas (Arab. & Pers.)

Habitat : — Throughout the plains of India.

Stems 2— 5ft., in large, dense tufts with stout spongy aromatic roots, sparingly branched, as thick below as a goose-quill. Leaves 1-2 ft., subbifarious, narrow acute, erect, keeled, glabrous, margins scabrid ; sheaths equitant, glabrous ; ligule