P. elongata, Mart., Java.
P. Himalayana, Grit, Sikkim.
P. Khassiana, Khassya.
P. macrostachya, Kurz, Tenasscrim. Zalacca edulis.
Z. Wallichiana, Mart., Burma.
vii. Nipineas.
Nina fruticans, Roxb., Malayans.
Others, mostly of the E. and W. Indies, merit ing notice are Acrocomia sclerocarpa, Macaw palm, W. Indies, Brazil. Astrocaryon murumura, and A. tucuma.
Calamosagus harinnfolius, laciniosus, and ohriger. Carludovica palmata of Panama.
Ceratolobus glauceacens, Bl., Java.
Dnmonorops melanochoetes, 131., Java. Eugeissonia truncate, Griffith, Malacca, Penang. Euterpe montana of Venezuela.
IIyphmne Thebaica, Bourn-palm of Egypt. Iriartea ventricosa or Pashiuba barriguda. Jubma spectabilis, Chili palm.
Leopoldinia pulchra, Java.
Lodoicea Sechellarum, LOW, Seychelles. Macrocladus sylvicolia, Gr.
Phytelephas macrocarpa, vegetable ivory palm. Pritchardia Pacifica of Polynesia.
Ptychospenna Alexandra:, Von Mueller, Australia. Slackia geonoformis.
Stevensonia of the Seychelles.
Thrinax argentca, Cuban palm.
Tucuma vulgare, Brazil, Rio Nigro, Upper Amazon. Verschaffeltia of Seychelles.
Many of the palms in tropical countries are conspicuous for their lofty pillar-like stems, sur mounted by apparently inaccessible fruit or gigantic foliage. Palms appear to prefer a soil in some measure saline, although many species are inhabitants altogether of inland districts, and even of high mountains. Their geographical limits appear to be within lat. 36° N. in America, lat. 44° N. in Europe, lat. 34° N. in Asia, and lat. 33° S. in the southern hemisphere. Their powers of migra tion are extremely small; few of them have been able to cross the ocean without the aid of man. This remark, however, is not applicable so far as regards the cocoanut, which with its keeled fruit sails to the most distant shores. Their favourite stations are on the banks of rivers and water courses, and the sea-shore some species scattered singly, and others collected together into large forests. in general they adhere to the soil by clusters of strong simple roots, which not uncom monly form a hillock elevated above the surface of the ground. Their trunks are solid, harder on the outside than the centre, and are sometimes, as in the cane-palms, coated by a layer of silicious matter ; they are usually quite simple, growing exclusively by a single terminal bud, called in the oreodoxa and areca its cabbage, and eaten as a delicacy when boiled ; but in the hyphmne, or doum-palm, they are regularly forked. In the
majority of the order the stem is cylindrical, but in some it is thickest at the base, and in others swollen in the middle ; occasionally it is defended by strong hard spines, but is more frequently un armed, and marked by rings which indicate the places whence the leaves fell off. The leaves, called fronds by Linnaeus, are alternate, with a very hard epidermis and a distinct petiole, from the base of which a coarse network, called re ticulum, sometimes separates next the trunk ; they are usually either pinnated or fan-shaped, but are occasionally nearly split in two ; their veins are parallel, the spaces between them plaited, and the whole size sometimes very great, as in the fan-palm, in which specimens have been seen as much as 18 or 20 feet in breadth. The flowers appear in panicled spikes from the inside of hard dry spathes, which are often boat-shaped, and, although small, they are sometimes so ex tremelynumerous that each panicle will weigh many pounds. They are generally hermaphrodite, but often moncecious, dicecious, or polygamous. The calyx and corolla consist each of three pieces, which are either distinct or more or less united. The stamens vary in number, from three to a large multiple of that number, and bear two-celled linear anthers, which open along their inner face. The ovary consists of three carpels, which are sometimes distinct, sometimes consolidated, and occasionally in part abortive, so that the ovary is only one-celled. The ovaries are almost always solitary, and erect in each cell, but sometimes two are present, which in that case stand side by side ; they are orthotropous in some genera, and anatropous in others. The styles are very short, the stigmas simple. The fruit varies extremely in its consistence and appearance. Sometimes it is three-celled, often one-celled. In some species, as the cocoanut, it is a kind of drupe covered by a coarse fibrous rind ; in others it is a soft, sweet, eatable pericarp, as in the date ; in others its surface is broken up into lozenge-shaped spaces, as in the sagas, whose fruit looks as if covered with scale armour. The seed is single, either solid or hollow, and consists principally of albumen of a fleshy, oily, horny, or cartilaginous texture, within which is lodged a very small cylindrical embryo at some part of the surface distant from the hilum.