122 cook: the mascarene cabbage palm 



beginning only 1 cm. or less above the spathe scar. Branches 58, all 

 simple, attaining a length of 45-53 cm., about 5 mm. thick, at base 

 1 cm. or more, tapering to the apex. Total length of axis 32 cm., 

 26 cm. above lowest branch. 



Buds and flowers light green, the petals somewhat yellowish green, 

 the sepals paler and more whitish. Filaments and pistillode white. 

 Anthers and pollen rather dull, light yellow or buff. Flowers mostly 

 in groups of two, in broad impressions or notches; only staminate 

 (lowers on the branch collected. Pistillate flowers with the calyx 

 n inch larger, and petals imbricate instead of valvate, as shown on the 

 fruits. Pistillode narrowly conic, from a somewhat broader base, 

 slightly iobed at apex, over half as long as the filaments. Mature 

 fruits purplish, with grayish bloom in the wrinkles, pointed-oval, 1.6 

 cm. long, 9mm. wide, with a mesocarp of vertical fibers and an endo- 

 carp of columnar shell tissue, as in Loroma and Archontophoenix. 

 Seeds 1.1 cm. long by 7 mm. wide, oval, showing an open network of 

 ruminations, much plainer than in Archontophoenix. 



Examined afterward at Washington, the seeds seemed to be 

 the same as those representing Dictyosperma album (Bory) in the 

 collections. The species is a native of the Mascarene Islands in 

 the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar, and is rather well known 

 liorticulturally. 



Nevertheless, the identification appeared unsatisfactory be- 

 cause the generic description of Dictyosperma was in some repects 

 distinctly inapplicable, and the availability of the name Dictyo- 

 sperma was brought into question by Mr. S. C. Stuntz. The 

 same name had been used twice before being applied to the 

 palm, first in the form Dyctisperma, proposed by Rafinesque in 

 1838 for a genus of Rubiaceae, and again as Dictyospermum, 

 applied by Wight in 1853 to a genus of spiderworts. Its appli- 

 cation to a genus of palms, in the form Dictyosperma, dates from 

 1875. Still another version, Dyctosperma, perhaps accidental, 

 appeared in a list of palms published by Wendland in 1878. 2 



No detailed description or reference to particular material is 

 given in connection with the original description of Dictyosperma, 

 but the distribution, " Insulae Borboniae et Franciae," is stated, 

 also the u Species typica: Areca alba Bory." 3 But in spite of the 



Kerchove de Denterghem, O. Les Palmiers, p. 254. 1878. 



•Wendland, H., and Drtjde, O. Palmae Auslralasicae, Linnaea, 39: 181. 

 1875. 



