852 Cook : NOMENCLATURE OF THE ROYAL PALMS 
unrelated East Indian palm.* In De natiirlichen Phanzenfamitien, 
Professor Drude recognizes six genera of American palms of the 
group in which Euterpe and Oreodoxa are placed, though he dis- 
tributes them among three separate series of Old World genera, 
from the Malay region and the islands of the Pacific and Indian 
Oceans. They seem, however, to constitute a compact natural 
group, as coherent in their characters as they are in their 
geographical distribution, and worthy of taxonomic recognition as 
a distinct tribe. 
The genera of the tribe Acr7steae may be separated by the fol- 
lowing diagnostic characters : 
1. Staminate flowers with spherical or ovoid ae and sessile stigmas ; pistillate 
eae united into a six-toothed cup. Genus RoysTONEA Cook ; 
ge vee UN B. K.) Cook, Cuba. 
Staminate flowers with conical or cclumnar pistillodes 3-parted at apex ; stamens 
and staminodes free, 2. 
2. Ripe fruit with stigma-scar basal. Genus HyospaTHE, Martius; type, 7. e/egans 
Martius, Brazil. 
Ripe fruit with stigma-scar lateral or apical. KS 
3. Leaves ere divided below, entire above, ending in a large simple bifurcate 
blade. Genus Prestora Hook. f.; type, P. pubigera (Griseb. & Wendl.) Hook. 
_f., Trinidad 
Leaves divided throughout into equal or graded narrow pinnae. 4+ 
4. Stamens ; inflorescence interfoliar.. Genus JessENIA, Karsten; type, /- 
serene © =e Brazil. 
Stamens 6; inflorescence distinctly infrafoliar. 5- 
5. Internodes short, leaf-bases not long-sheathing. Genus OENOCARPUS Martius ; types 
O. distichus Martius, Brazil. 
Internodes long, leaves with long sheathing bases. 6. 
6. Calyx al staminate (or bisexual?) flowers with sepals united at base. Genus 
OREODOXA Willd. ; type, O. acuminata Willd., Venezuela. 
Calyx asa three distinct broadly imbricate sepals. t 
7- Trunk attenuate, increasing in thickness with age ; spathes ensiform, flat ; branches 
of spadix subtended by large spathe-like bracts; seeds with uniform albumen. 
Genus PLEcTIS; ¢ type, P. Oweniana sp. nov., Guatemala, 
* Bull. Torrey Club, 28: 556. 1901. 
t Plectis gen. nov. 
Trunk solitary, very tall, slender and tapering, the diameter increasing with age: 
Leaves long-sheathing at base; petiole short; pinnae very numerous, narrow wly 
linear, horizontal or droopin 
hes numerous, coriaceous, but thin and flexible ; outer spathes short ; two long 
ensiform complete spathes ; a large lanceolate-ligulate incomplete spathe bad the 
lowest branch of the spadix ; a small ligulate spathe or bract subtends each of the ot other 
branches. 
