GRAINNE NI-MHAILLE. 112 GRAMINE^. sixteenth eentiiry. She was the daugliter of Owen O'Malley, chief of his clan and adniiial of the Connacht lleet, and was born in West Galway ahout 1540. During the Elizabethan wars she took constant and active jjart against the English and their Anglo-Xorinan supporters, sallying out from Galway Bay at the head of her fleet to de- stroy the English shipping or ravage the Norman dependencies along the coast. She was twice mar- ried, and seems always to have been the dominant partner. In 1557, while cruising on the coast of Kerr}', she was captured by the troops of the Earl of Desmond, bj- wiiom she was held prisoner for a year and a half, but on being released at once renewed her forays, and in 1578 defeated a strong expedition sent against her, thus making her name so dreaded that she was permitted to ride through (iulway city inimolested. Some years later, lier husband dying and her two sons having alread}' been killed, she was induced by a promise of safety to put herself in the power of the Eng- lish Governor of Galway, bj' whom she was sen- tenced to be hanged, but was ransomed by her husband's cousin. In 1591, after several other forays and encounters along the western coast, in one of which she was shipwrecked and forced to remain in hiding for some time, she led a fleet of twenty galleys against some sea rovers from the Hebrides. In 1593, and again two years later, she visited London, and is said to have made submission, but apparently to little pur- pose, as in 1001 we find record of one of her ships with 100 musketeers being captured by an English sloop of war. GBAIN-RUST. See Rust. GRAINS OF PARADISE, or Meleguetta Pepper. An aronuitic and extremely hot and pungent seed, imported from Guinea. It is the produce of Amomitm meleguetta, or Amomum granum paradisi, a plant of the order Zingiber- acecB, with lanceolate leaves, one-flowered scapes (leafless stems), about three feet high, and ovat« or elliptie-oblong capsviles containing many seeds. By the natives of Africa these seeds are used as a spice or condiment to season their food ; in Europe they are chiefly employed as a medicine in veterinary practice, and fraudulently to in- crease the pungency of fermented and spirituous liquors. During the reign of George III. brewers and dealers in beer in England were prohibited, under a heavy penalty, from even having the seeds in their possession. The name meleguetta pepper, or Guinea pepper (q.v.). is also given to other pungent seeds from the west of Africa. GBAKIiE (from Lat. gractilus, graeeiilus, Jackdaw, onomatopoetie in origin). A kind of •bird. (1) In America, a blackbird of the genus "Qniscalus or the genis Scoleeophagus of the famjiv Icteridfe. (See Blackbird.) The best Ik.nmvn of those is the puqvle grakle or 'crow- blackbird' {Qniscahis qiiiscula) , which is found throughout the United States as far as Dakota, and thence northwestward to Alaska. It is about 12 inches long, and the male is uniform glossy black with metallic reflections. Larger species are the boat-tail {Quiacalns major), and a Mexi- can species {Qiiisralus macrurus) is distin- guished by having a disproportionately long tail. Well-known species of the other genus are the •nidely distributed rusty grakle (Scoleeophagus CaroUnvn). 9 inches long, the male dead black; and Brewer's {Scoleeophagus cyanocephalus) , of the Rocky Mountain region, which is a uniform glossy, greenish black, the head and neck glossy violet-black. In all species the females and young are gray or brownish, more or less streaked. These birds have all the characteristics described under Blackbird. See Plate of Black- niRD.s, and Colored Plate of EuGS of SongBirds.
- (2) In the Old Yorld the name is given to
various oirds of the starling family (Sturnida) and myna family (Eulabetidae) , of the genera Acridotheres, Eulabes, etc. The Linnaean genus 'Gracula' is difficult of definition, and is passing out of use. IMost of the Indian birds called 'grakles' are better known as mynas or hill- niynas (q.v.). GRAM. East Indian name for chick-pea (q.v. ) . GRAM (Fr., from Lat. gramma, Gk. ypaju/ia, weight of two obols, writing, from ypaifieiv, gra- phein, to write). A measure of weight. See Metric System. GRAMINE..ffi, gra-mln'e-e (Lat. nom. pi., pertaining to grass, from gramen, grass). The great family of grasses, which is one of the largest and probably one of the most useful groups of plants, as well as one of the most pecu- liar. It is world-wide in its distribution, and is remarkable in its display of individuals, often growing so densely over large areas as to form a compact turf. If the grass-like sedges be associated with the true grasses, there are ALOPECURUS PBATENS18. a, The cylindrical spike; h, a single flower with Its glumes; c, flowering glume with its awn; d, the pistil. about 6000 species, representing nearly one-third of all of the monocotyledons (q.v.). Here belong the various cereals, sugar-canes, bamboos, and pasture grasses, all of them eminently useful plants. They are, for the most part, perennial herbs with profusely branching rootstocks which creep horizontally in the soil and give rise both to sterile shoots in the form of tufts of leaves, and also to fertile shoots. The characteristic leaf of
