This naturaTorder of plants is one of the largest, the most beautiful, as well as the most useful, of the whole vegetable kingdom. Palms are associ ated with the most sublime truths of Christianity. In everyday life we speak of our " palmy days," and " carrying off the palm," as happy and excellent times and seasons of rejoicing. In the Old Testa ment, the palm-tree is first mentioned as the tamar, in Exodus xv. 27, but afterwards frequently. Psalm xcii. 12, 13, and 14, says the righteous shall flourish like a palm-tree; and in Canticles vii. 7, the erect and slender form of woman is compared to the palm : "Lo, thy stature is like a palm-tree, and thy bosom like clusters of dates." In the temple of Solomon were pilasters made in the form of palm-trees. A branch of a palm was a signal of victory, and was carried before con querors in the triumphs. They were borne before Christ in his way to Jerusalem, as in John xii. 13 ; and allusion is made to this in Revelation vii. 9.
They are remarkable for the many useful pur poses they are calculated to fulfil. They furnish many of the necessaries, comforts, and luxuries of life. In household economy, parts of them are formed into spoons, and cups, and ladles, and lamps, and hats, and clothes, and combs, ham mocks, bowstrings, fishing lines, and fish hooks. The light rafters of the houses are obtained from the straight cylindrical trunks of the Java palm (Leopoldinia pulchra), the date, and the palmyra tree. The sweeper of the crossings of London holds in his hand a broom, the fibrous portion of which was cut by the wild Indians of Brazil from the stems of a palm. The gentleman who prides him self on his Penang Lawyer is but carrying a young plant of the Licuala acutifida. The knob of the lady's parasol is formed from a Coquilla nut turned into that shape. The chip hats, so exten sively worn on fine summer days, are made of the leaves of a Cuban palm (Thrinax argentea). Heaps of dates are to be seen in all the shops of Europe, which were gathered by the Bedouin Arabs, or on the borders of the great desert of Sahara ; and cocoanuts, grown on the shores of the Indian Ocean, in the myriads of islands which form its archipelago, or on the shores of the Caribbean Sea, are sold in every city of the colder regions of the world, where they are ever beheld with unabated curiosity. The cordage and rigging of the ships, and the thick mattings used on stair cases in Britain, spun and woven, are from the husk of the cocoanut, and many articles of furni ture are made from the woods of palms. Toys and ornaments are made from the kernels of the vegetable ivory palm. The stearic candles, so well known, are composed of the fatty substance extracted from the oil-palm and the cocoanut. The sago, which is so useful a food in the treat ment of the sick, and which is seen in such varied guise on our tables, is the pith of palms that flourish in many tropical regions ; the famous betel-nut dentifrice, formed of the charcoal of that nut, coloured with dragon's blood, is the produce of two palms ; and the toilet soaps of Europe are made from palm oils. The roof is thatched with the leaves of palms. In one region, the door of the house is made of the split stems of the Pashiuba palm (Iriartea exorhiza). The harpoon for catching the cow-fish is formed of the black wood of the Pashiuba barriguda (Iriartea ventri cosa), and in another region the thickly matted leaves of the cocoanut and palmyra, serve as a door for the gardens and parterres.' The palm oils from the Elmis Guineensis, and from the cocoanut palm of the East Indies, are extensively in the west and east. The Elmis Guineensis also yields an excellent palm wine. The numerous uses to which the cocoa nut palm are applied are familiar even to all who have not seen it. It grows on all the shores of the East and West Indies, and the leaves furnish thatch for dwellings, materials for buckets, baskets, and fences, and make excellent torches. The juice of the flower stem is fermented into palm wine, distilled into arrack, or made into sugar.
when green, is filled with a liquid bumen, which is largely drunk as a refreshing liquid ; when ripe the albumen solidifies, and is used in cooking, and affords an abundance of oil, which is used in lamps, and hi Europe is manu factured into candles. The fibrous rind forms the coir of commerce, made into cordage and cables. The cocoanut, the date, and others are valued for their fruit; the fan-palm and many more for their foliage, whose hardness and durability render it an excellent material for thatching ; the sweet juices of the palmyra, the date, the cocoa nut, and Arenga palms, when fermented yield wine ; tho centre of the sago-palm abounds in nutritive starch ; the trunk of an Iriartea or Ceroxylon exudes a valuable vegetable wax; an astringent matter resembling dragon's blood is produced by Calamus draco ; many of the species contain within their leaves so hard a kind of fibrous matter, that it is employed instead of needles, or so tough that it is manufactured into cordage; and their trunks are in some cases valued for their strength, and used as timber, or, as in the cane-palm, for their elasticity or their flexi bility. The fruit of some is edible, of others
abounding in oil. The stems of some species are gorged with farinaceous matter, which may be separated as a starch-like powder, or granulated into sago. The broad leaves, from their great size and hard surface, are useful for thatehine. the cottages of the poor, or for making umbrellas for the rich. The narrow-leaved kinds are plaited into mats and baskets, or smoothed so as to be fit for writing on ; while the leaves of several, when in a young and tender state, are eaten both raw and in a cooked state, and are hence called cabbage-palms. Some abound in strong unyield ing fibre, while others form wood which is ap plicable to all the purposes of timber. Hence several are valuable articles of culture in the countries where they are indigenous, or where the soil and climate are suitable for their growth —as for instance the date-palm in Arabia and Africa, the oil-palm in the west of Africa, the cocoanut in India and its islands, together with the betel-nut, palmyra, and talipat palms ; while the sago, the eju, and the betel - nut palms flourish in the moist warm climates of the Malay Peninsula, and of the Indian Archipelago. The palms abound chiefly in the tropical parts of the Old World, as well as of South America, but a few species extend to rather high latitudes, as an areca to lat. 38° S. in New Zealand, and a cabal (Chammrops, And.) to lat. 40° N. in North America ; while the dwarf-palm, a native of the North of Africa, is now at home in the south of Europe, where even the date-palm is grown in a few sheltered situations, though it is in the hot and dry soil of Arabia and Africa that it attains the greatest perfection, and furnishes a principal part of the diet of its inhabitants, as well as an article of commerce. Phrenix sylvestris, a variety or species of the same genus, is common in moat parts of India. A Chainverops is found in Nepal, and one on the Khassya hills, at elevations of 5000 to 8000 feet ; while C. Ritchieana is found in the Khaibar pass, and probably all along the mountain ous range from Afghanistan to Sind. In southern latitudes the cocoa and the betel-nut palms are objects of extensive culture, as well as the sago - palms, of which the eju or gomuti of the Malays, the Arenga saccliarifera of botanists, is one abounding in lap, which can be used as palm wine or converted into sugar, also yielding at all times strong and durable fibre. The older trees when cut down yield sago, as do Segue Rumphii and S. Levis, especially abundant in and near Sumatra, the latter being remarkable among palms for throw ing up young plants around it in the same manner as tho plantain, 31m paradisiaca, It is no doubt to some one of these sago trees that Sir John Maun deville alludes when ho says, In that land grow trees that bear meal, of which men make bread, white and of good savour ; and it meometh as It were of wheat, but it is not quite of such savour. And there are other trees that bear good and sweet honey, and others that bear poison. And if you like to hear how the meal comes out of the trces,—men hew the trees with a hatchet, all about the foot, till the bark be separated in many parts, and then conies out a thick liquor, which they receive in vessels, and dry it in the sun, and then carry it to a mill to grind, and it becomes fair and white meal; and the honey, and the wine, and the poison are drawn out of other trees in the same manner, and put in vessels to keep.' The leaves of many palms are employed for thatching, for making chattaa or umbrellas, punkahs, and hats. The stems of Licuala peltata, the Chatta-pat of Assam, are in universal demand in that valley. Scarcely a single ploughman, cow keeper, or coolie, but has his jhapi or chatta made of chatta-pat. But the leaves of this palm are coarser than those of the toka-pat of the Assamese, which was named Livistona Jenkin siana by Griffith. Colonel Jenkins says that this species of palm is an indispensable accompaniment of every native gentleman's house ; but in some parts it is rare, and the trees are then of great value. The leaves are in universal use throughout Assam for covering the tops of dhoolies or palkees, and the roofs of khel boats; also for making the umbrella hats (jhapi) of the Assamese. For all these purposes the leaves are admirably adapted, from their lightness, toughness, and durability. To the above list of useful Indian palms might be added the Zalacca macrostachya, used for making baskets and for tying Nipa leaves. The Chinese make cables of the rattan. The vestiaria is so called from clothing being made from its fibres, and Rhapis Cochin-Chinensis is employed for thatching, etc. Lodoicea Sechellarum is the palm yielding the much famed Cocoa de 3fer, or double cocoanut,—for one of which, in the Mauritius collection, a prize medal was awarded at the Exhibition of 1851; its leaves are formed into baskets and flowers, and the nut, formed into a dish, is largely used as a scallop by the Muham madan fakirs.