NOTE ON PLECTOCOMIA GRIFFITHII BECC. 73 



The three cases I call attention to are, I think, quite different ; 

 the near allies of Cijpenis vegetw^, for instance, are all American 

 l^lants ; no way of writing out or of redistributing into subspecies 

 this American material would affect the remarkable establishment 

 of C. vegetus Willd. in Europe and in New Zealand. 



NOTE ON PLECTOCOMIA GRIFFITHII Becc. 

 By a. B. Rendle, M.A., F.L.S. 



In rearranging the Palm-case in the public gallery of the 

 Department of Botany at the British Museum, I found among 

 the Calamem a specimen of somewhat unusual interest. It had 

 been previously exhibited as Plectoconiia elongata Mart., sent by 

 Griffith from Malacca, and was thus labelled in Griffith's hand- 

 writing. As it was obviously different from other specimens of 

 P. elom/ata, it was necessary to investigate further. Reference to 

 Griffith's Pithns of British P'ast India showed the plant to be the 

 P. elongata of that work ; and tab. ccxvii a might have been drawn 

 from the British Museum specimen. A fruiting specimen had also 

 been exhibited under the same label, and that is equally well 

 represented by tab. ccxvii c. Our plant is therefore Plectocomia 

 (irijfithii Becc. in Flor. Brit. India, vi. 478, of which Sir Joseph 

 Hooker says, in a note, that he has seen no specimen. 



The only difficulty is in relation to tab. ccxvii e, which forms 

 part of Griffith's P. elongata, and its relation to tab. ccxvii a 

 Tab. ccxvii a is inscribed Plectocomia elongata (foem.), and on the 

 opposite page is this footnote: — "Dr. Martins' figures represent 

 the spathes of the male and female alike ; in the female specimens 

 before me, though the flowers are open, the spathes are so closely 

 imbricated and so concave that the branches are strictly subulate 

 in form." This implies a difference between the form of the 

 spathels ("spathes" of Griffith) in the two sexes, and tends to 

 the conclusion that tab. ccxvii b represents a male plant (though 

 this is not stated), a conclusion which is supported by the appear- 

 ance of the flowers, which, although the spathels are spreading 

 open, show no indication of styles. Our male specimens have, 

 however, precisely the appearance of tab. ccxvii a ; the branches 

 of the inflorescence are narrowly cylindrical in form, and the 

 spathels have their margins united to the top ; and as the flowers 

 seem quite mature, it is difficult to understand how the plate in 

 question (ccxvii b) can refer to P. Grijfithii Becc. Is it some 

 other species — e. g. true P. elongata Mart. ? If it belongs to 

 P. iiri^ffitliii, we must suppose that it represents part of a female 

 inflorescence, and in the footnote on p. 104 and on the plate 

 ccxvii A must read male ior female. Unfortunately we have no young 

 female inflorescence at the Museum ; a few flowers occur in the 

 fruiting specimen, but the spathels are all widely spreading, as 

 drawn in t. ccxvii c, and whether or no they were ever in the 

 condition of tab. a it is impossible to conjecture. 



