178 DB. n. SPBITCE ON [Phj/telephas. 



nuts, whose "ivory" has long been in use with the turners of 



Ecuador. I gave a brief account of the Cadi in a letter to Su* W. 

 J. Hooker, in 1859 (published in the Linn. Joum.vol.iv, p. 186), 

 and I propose now to call it Phytelephas cequatorialis . It differs 

 chiefly from the other two species in the stout and often quite erect 

 trunks reacliing 15 or even 20 feet in height — in the tine qually pin- 

 nate leaves^ the pinnce being not equidistant (as in the others) btit 

 aggregate hy threes and fours along the rhachis — in the male capi- 

 tula heing stalJced or racemed on a pendulous spadix — and in the very 

 nv/nterous stamens^ oftvhich each capitulum contains a thousand or 

 more. 



Phytelephas cequatorialis abounds in the Guayaquilian plain, 

 and up the Andine valleys to a height of 5000 feet, especially to- 

 wards Mount Chimborazo. I should expect to find it extending 

 northward along the coast of the Pacific to within the bounda- 

 ries of New Grranada ; but the Ivory-Palm of that country should 

 be a distinct species, if the figure in Seemann's ^ Popular History 

 of Palms ' has been taken from the trvie plant ; for it represents 

 a stemless Palm with equably pinnate leaves. It is, indeed, within 

 the limits of possibility that several species of Phytelephas remain 

 to be discovered on both sides of the Andes, and even in the lands 

 lying northward of the Isthmus of Panama*. 

 ^ The characters of the three species may be contrasted as 

 follows : 



1. P, MiCROCARPA, R, et P. : caudice nuUo v. tenui inclinato ; folii^ 



jequaliter pinnatis longiusciJe petiolatis Hab. in sylvis Pe- 



TuviJB orientalis, ditione Maynensi, et ^quatorialibus ** de Canelos 

 dictis, prsecipue ad flum. Amazonum supra fl. Napo ostia, et in An- 

 dibus inferioribus, ubi ad 2500 pedum alt. ascendit. — " Yarina " in- 

 colarum. 



2. P. MACROCARPA, R, et P, I CRudice nuUo v. perbrevi valido incli- 

 nato; foliis seq^ualiter pinnatis, petiolo subnuUo; spadicibus ma- 

 sculis erecto-arcuatis, capitulis sessilibus, staminibus 150-280. — ff^b, 



* The Ivory-Palm found by Dr. Seemann along the Pacific coast of New Gra- 

 nada, wbere it is called *' Anta " agrees with the Cadi in the male flowers being 

 '* attached to fleshy spikes, which are from four to five feet long, and hang 

 down," but differs in the leaves and in the "aerial roots " (such as I have not 

 seen in any Phytelephas) which aid to drag the Palm into a recumbent posture, 

 when it ** forms a creeping caudex, which is not unfrequently more than twenty 



feet long" (Voy. of the Herald/ i. 223). The "Tagua" of the Magdalenn ftp- 

 pears to be another and veiy distinvt .specie*. 



