Mr. G. Clark on the Cocoa-nut of the Seychelles Islands. 447 
eight years after the fecundation, the drupe has become fibrous, 
and from a rich dark green has turned to a reddish yellow, and 
falls from the stem. Germination takes place sometimes before, 
sometimes after, the fall of the fruit, the shell of which is hard 
and black, and marked all over by traces of the fibres which 
were inserted in it; and a bunch of these fibres, much resem- 
bling coarse black hair, remains in the orifice from which the 
germ sprouts. The yellow bitter substance has become a 
leathery skin, enclosing the perisperm; and the soft jelly-like 
mass has been condensed into a tasteless kernel, as hard as 
beech-wood, of a pure white colour, leaving a large cavity in each 
lobe of the nut ; and at the point of junction of the two lies the 
embryo, of turbinated form. The germ, in passing through the 
orifice mentioned, becomes fibrous, assumes a club-shape, and 
curves towards the ground, which it penetrates. The radicle 
descends vertically, and from it sprout the rootlets. Ata depth 
of 2 or 24 feet sprouts a fibrous leaf, at an angle of about forty- 
five degrees. This leaf seems to perform the office of a coty- 
ledon to that which follows it, and which springs from its side. 
Kach succeeding leaf becomes larger, and approaches more 
nearly to a vertical direction, till the crown is formed, when they 
succeed each other in the usual way. The trunk does not show 
itself till twenty or twenty-five years after the germination of 
the nut ; and fourteen or fifteen years from this period the plant 
is in its greatest beauty, and begins to blossom. As many as 
eight or ten spadices may be seen on a tree at the same time, 
the male flowers, as has been said, retaining their bloom; and 
the female flowers seem to have the power of waiting an inde- 
finite period for fecundation. Six or seven full-sized drupes 
may be sometimes seen on one spadix; but although as many 
as eight female flowers may be seen on one stem, it is rare to see 
more than three or four arrive at maturity. Imperfect fecun- 
dation often takes place, and a partial development of the drupe 
goes on. In this case it becomes deformed, assumes a curved 
shape, and falls a useless abortion. The Coco-de-Mer grows in 
every kind of soil, but attains its greatest size and beauty in the 
deep moist gorges of the mountains, where a rich bed of humus 
favours the growth of that as well as of other palms, some of 
which greatly surpass it in height. By the sea-side, and in 
situations much exposed to the wind, the Coco-de-Mer presents 
a somewhat barren aspect; its leaves, bemg renewed so slowly, are 
withered and rent, and the trees might be supposed to be dying. 
It has been observed that, at the discovery of the islands which 
produce it, vast forests of the Coco-de-Mer existed. The height 
and smoothness of the trunk rendered it a less difficult matter 
to cut down a high tree than to climb it, to obtain its fruit; and 
