386 Rock: A NEW SPECIES OF PRITCHARDIA 
‘ 
explorations will doubtless increase our knowledge of this beauti- 
ful genus of palms. 
Pritchardia Beccariana Rock, sp. nov. 
_ Trunk 20-25 m. tall, about 4o cm. in diameter at the base, 
cylindrical, grayish, smooth, about 30 cm. in diameter breast- 
high, with more or less distant rings, showing the attachment of 
the leaves, the crown of leaves forming perfect globose heads of 
large dimensions; leaves large, suborbicular, measuring I.5 m. 
or more from the ligule to the apex of the median segment, the 
ligule rotundate and prolonged in the middle to a distinct point; 
petioles 3 m. long in young fronds, 1.5-2 m. in mature fronds, 
stout, and covered on the under side with a fawn-colored squam- 
aceous tomentum; segments about sixty, each segment 4-4.5 cm. 
wide, and subdivided again for 30 cm. into linear-acuminate lobes, 
with filaments 15-25 cm. long in the bifurcations, the lower surface 
of the leaves, especially near the petiole and costae covered with 
a squamaceous, flaky tomentum, upper surface glabrous; spadix 
2-3 m. long including a main peduncle of 1 m., the spadix branch- 
ing into three to five large open panicles at intervals of 3-4 dm.; 
the terete peduncle 2 cm. in diameter, enclosed by various, tubu- 
lose spathes 70-80 cm. long; panicles compressed, loose, the first 
two or three open and loosely branched, the last two nearest the 
leaf-axil short and densely branched, the branchlets short and 
spirally twisted; the former bearing abortive flowers only, the 
latter, or often only the last’ panicle producing fertile flowers and 
mature fruits; each panicle enclosed in several, reddish brown 
spathes, 30-40 cm., long covered with a squamaceous tomentum 
on the outside; flowers subsessile, on the more or less tortuous 
branchlets of the compound panicle, those bearing fertile flowers 
spirally twisted; calyx 5 mm. long, tubular-cylindrical, truncate 
at base and apex, with three very short teeth; petals (?); staminal 
cup much longer than the calyx, exserted 3 mm., and terminating 
into six, somewhat compressed, filaments, 2 mm. long; anthers 
acute at the apex, obtuse and slightly notched at the base, 3.5 m™- 
long, attached at about the middle to the filament; style columnar, 
triquetrous, with three punctiform stigmas at the apex; mature 
fruits large, subglobose; black, shining, 4 cm. in diameter, slightly 
flattened on one side, with a short conical apex; epicarp black, 
thin, fragile at the maturity of the fruit and exposing the thick, 
fibrous mesocarp, 5-6 mm. thick at the base, thinner at the apex: 
endocarp ligneous, 1 mm. thick; cavity of the endocarp circular, 
slightly flattened at the base, 2.75 cm. in diameter, not situat 
exactly in the middle of the fruit, but a little nearer to the apeX: 
