84 Dr. Francis HamiLzron’s Commentary 
but this culture has wonderfully improved the fruit ; so that from 
being useless, as in the Katou Indel, it has become one of the 
most valuable vegetable productions. — 
Linnzeus (Fl. Zeyl. 390.) however entirely adopted the opinion 
of Burman, and supposed the Indi Palm to be the same with 
that which produces dates, and to be so common in India that 
it had communicated its name to the country. This opinion, 
however, could only be adopted on the supposition that the Katou 
Indel is the Indi: but the whole hypothesis seems groundless ; 
for in the dialects of the North of India the Katou Indel is called 
Khajur in the vulgar, and Kharjuri in the sacred dialect (Ka- 
souri of the Brahmans of Malabar); and it was no doubt from 
some circumstance attending the North of India that the West- 
ern nations gave this name to the country. ‘The Katou Indel, 
however, was considered by Linnæus as quite distinct from the 
Date-palm (Phenix dactylifera), and in the Flora Zeylanica, 391. 
was called Vaga ; but when he published the Species Plantarum, 
he changed this name to Elate sylvestris (Burm. Fl. Ind. 241.), 
considering it, on very slight and insufficient grounds, as the 
Elate arbor of the Romans, which was a tree used in preparing 
ointments, as Pliny mentions (Nat. Hist. l. xii. c. 28.), ** quam 
alii Elatam vocant, nos Abietem, alii Palmam, alii Spathen. 
Laudatur Hammoniaca maxime, mox Ægyptia, dein Syriaca, 
duntaxatin locis sitientibus odorata, pingui lachryma, quæ in un- 
guenta additur ad domandum oleum." "The reason, probably, 
why Pliny calls it Abies is, that EA27; was the Greek name for the 
Latin Abies: but there is no reason to suppose that this grows 
either in Egypt or in the Oasis of Ammon. Linnæus was there- 
fore no doubt justifiable in rejecting this supposition of Pliny: 
but when he adopted the term Palma, used also as synonymous 
with Elate in Pliny, he should have considered that this was a 
generic term; and before he confounded the Elate with the 
Katou 
