exhibiting an appearance of three cells (¢. 2737. f.1.): the 
whole upper part, a little above the letter a of f- 2, t. 2736, 
is a pulpy mass, traversed by longitudinal vessels. In 
other germens there is no trace of cells. The stigma is 
sessile (unless the great mass above the insertion of the 
ovules may be considered as a style), having a minute, three- 
lobed aperture. As the fruit advances to maturity, one or 
two of the cells become abortive, and the germen, rounded 
before, then appears depressed on one side. (A vertical 
section of an unripe fruit is given at f. 2, and a transverse 
section, at f. 3 of t. 2737, in both of which there appears 
to be but a single seed or nut.) 
Many, indeed, of the germens are wholly abortive. A 
single spadix ripens from five to six fruits, each as large as 
the largest melon, often a foot and a half in length, weigh- 
ing twenty, or twenty-five pounds, oval, rounded, or com- 
pressed on one side, and more or less acuminated, the base 
surrounded by the greatly enlarged Perianth (t. 2738, f. 1.). 
The external coat, or Pericarp, is formed by a thick enve- 
lope, or husk, which bears much resemblance to the coat 
of the common walnut, but is vastly thicker in proportion, 
having nearly the same form and colour, that is, a deep 
green. Before the fruit has attained its perfect maturity, 
the interior, near the base, is divided into two parts, and 
contains a substance like a white jelly (¢. 2737, f. 2, a), 
firm, transparent and sweet to the taste. A single Cocoa- 
nut holds, perhaps, three pints of this substance ; but if kept 
a few days, it turns sour, thick, and unpalatable, giving 
out a very disagreeable smell. 
One, two, or three, rarely four nuts are found within 
each pericarp. These nuts are a foot long, broadly ovate, 
or elliptical, at the base very obtuse, at the upper extremity 
notched into two or three, rarely four deep lobes, hemi- 
herical on one side, compressed on the other, of a dark 
brown almost black colour, and a very hard woody texture, 
marked externally with shallow furrows (¢. 2738, f. 2, 3.). 
This nut is divided in the middle by a dissepiment (two or 
three, probably, in those which are two or three lobed) of 
considerable thickness, but leaving a communication in 
the centre from which the Fane or infant plant eventually 
appears. The cavity is filled by the almond, which is ve 
hard, white, and corneous, so that it may be rasped wi 
a ox — with St a — iB eee 
welve months elapse, from the time of the appearance 
of the germen, before the fruits are fully ripe; aggre 
Se : ts ve 
