104 GALINSOGA PARVIFLORA. 
in the apostrophe would seem to imply that the author was speaking of 
a large fruit. The height of the tree mentioned in the papyrus (sixty 
cubits) tallies well with that usually attained by the cocoa-nut tree in 
the tropics and near the sea ; but it may be questioned whether that 
palm would attain its full dimensions in a place situated like Thebes. 
I have seen the tree struggling for existence at the very edge of the 
equinoctial region, even in its favourite haunts in the neighbourhood of 
the sea—for instance, the Sandwich Islands and the Gulf of California. 
There are no other points a botanist could lay hold of, and I may there- 
fore be permitted to guess what other palm can possibly be meant by 
the Mama-en-khanent. The palms of Egypt are the date and the 
doum (Phenix dactylifera and Hyphena Thebaica), both of which are 
disposed of by the writer in the ‘ Parthenon.’ But there is a palm in 
Nubia, and probably also in Upper Egypt, the deleb (Borassus ? 
Aithiopum), which has a fruit quite as large as some of the middle-sized 
kind of cocoa-nut, and the ventricose trunk of which has evidently been 
the prototype of the columns seen in Egyptian temples; the date palm, 
from which the capitals were copied (as is evident in the great temple 
of Edfou), having no such swelling in the trunk. There is a considerable 
quantity of water in the fruit of the deleb palm ; and as its height also 
agrees with that mentioned in the apostrophe, the balance of evidence 
would rather seem in favour of this tree as that meant by the Mama- 
en-khanent. This same palm has already been mistaken for the cocoa- 
nut tree; it is the palm of Timbuctoo, which Humboldt, misguided by 
erroneous information, thought to be Cocos nucifera, until, in 4 
paper read before the Linnean Society, I showed it to be Borassus ? 
Aithiopum.” 
GALINSOGA PARVIFLORA, Cav, A NATURALIZED | 
BRITISH PLANT. 
It is some years since I observed this plant growing in great abun- 
dance in the sunken gutters of the Asparagus grounds between Rich- 
mond and Sheen. Iam surprised that it has not yet been noticed in 
any of our Floras, as it seemed to me then completely naturalized. On 
mentioning the circumstance to my excellent friend the Rev. W. W- 
Newbould, he visited the district, and on his way found it quite as 
