Materials for a Flora of lite Malayan Peninsula. 133 



There seems to have been a good deal of confusion about this 

 plant, and the descriptions given in various works are hardly adequate. 

 I think it is pretty clear what Jack meant by this Veratrum malaya- 

 num but he states that it has three seeds. I have never seen more than 

 one developed. Being in unisexual plant it may often be found with 

 appai'ently ripe black fruit no larger than pepper corns, but examina- 

 tion of the seeds shows that they are abortive. I have however occa- 

 sionally met with plants exactly similar habit, with fruit still unripe 

 as big as cherries. These contain traces of three cells, one of which 

 contains a seed rounded on the outer surface and flattened on the inner 

 face. I presume these are fertilized fruits. The plant inhabits dense 

 forest in damp spots, quite unlike S. anthclminticum which is aquatic 

 with a long stem and long floating shoots. It varies a good deal in 

 size, sometimes flowering in a quite stemless state, with short leaves 

 and a short panicle, sometimes possessing a stem a foot or so long. 



XIX. PALMAE. 



Shrubs or trees erect or climbing occasionally prostrate, naked or 

 armed with thorns. Leaves alternate petiole sheathing limb pinnatisect, 

 or palmate, sometimes entire or bi-pinnate. Inflorescence panicled or 

 spicate axillary or subterminal enclosed at first in one or more sheath- 

 ing bracts, (spathes). Flowers small rarely large, white green or yel- 

 low, rarely pink unisexual or bisexual, usually quite sessile and sunk 

 in pits in the rachis. Perianth inferior. Sepals 3 short. Petals 3 

 longer. Stamens 3 to 6 or more, filaments free filiform or connate. 

 Anthers versatile. Ovary 1 to 3 celled, or of 3 1 -celled carpels. Ovules 

 1 to 3 in each cell, anatropous. Stigmas 3, usually sessile. Fruit 

 a drupe or hard nut ; pericarp fleshy fibrous or hard, or crustaceous, 

 smooth or rough, or covered with rhomboidal scales imbricating down- 

 wards. Seed erect or laterally attached, raphe usually branching all 

 over the testa. Albumen horny or bony equable or ruminate. Embryo 

 very small in a cavity of the albumen. 



Species over a thousand chiefly tropical ; most abundant in South 

 America and the Malayan region. 



1. ARECEAE, leaves pinnatisect, or rarely 

 entire. Inflorescence spicate or panicled, ap- 

 pearing from below upwards. Flowers unisexu- 

 al or bisexual, on the same inflorescence. Fruit 

 drupaceous. 



Male flowers asymmetric minute on the tips 

 of the branches. 



Females larger at the base ... ... 1. Areca. 



Male flowers 2 on either side of erch female 

 asymmetric unarmed albumen ruminate. 



Sepals and petals orbicular ••• ... 2. Pinanga. 



Sepals lanceolate as long as petals ... 3. Nenga. 



