240 CORALS AND CORAL LSLANDS. 



and possessing qualities that answer to the name ; but this is 

 procured at the expense of the fruit and the good of the tree, 

 and also of the best interests of the natives. 



It is doubted whether the ocean is ever successful in plant- 

 ing the cocoanut on coral islands. The nut seems to be well 

 fitted for marine transportation, through its thick husk, which 

 serves both as a float and a protection ; but there is no known 

 evidence that any island never inhabited has been found sup- 

 plied with cocoanut-trees. The possibility of a successful 

 planting by the waves cannot be denied ; but there are so 

 many chances that the floating nut will be kept too long in 

 the water, or be thrown where it cannot germinate, that the 

 probability of a transplanting is exceedingly small. This palm 

 — the Cocos ?iucifera of the botanists — is not included in the 

 list of native coral island species on page 238. 



Another tree, peculiarly fitted for the region, is the Pan- 

 danus or Screw-pine — well named as far as the syllable screiv 

 goes, but having nothing of a pine in its habit. Its long, 

 sword-like leaves, of the shape and size of those of a large 

 Iris, are set spirally on the few awkward branches toward 

 the extremity of each, and make a tree strikingly tropical in 

 character. It grows sometimes to a height of thirty feet. It 

 is well fitted for the poor and shallow soil of a coral island ; 

 for as it enlarges and spreads its branches, one prop after 

 another grows out from the trunk and plants itself in the 

 ground ; and by this means its base is widened, and the grow- 

 ing tree supported. The fruit, a large ovoidal mass made up 

 of oblong dry seed, diverging from a centre, each near two 

 cubic inches in size, affords a sweetish husky article of food, 

 which, though little better than prepared corn-stalks, admits 

 of being stored away for use when other things fail ; and at 

 the Gilbert Islands, and others in that part of the ocean, 

 is so employed. 



The Pisonia is another of the forest trees, and is one of 

 handsome foliage and large and beautiful flowers, sometimes 

 attaining a height of forty feet, and the trunk twenty in girth. 



Among the species that are earliest in taking root in the 



