SPINOSITY. 5 
portion are especially termed “claws.” There are, however, numerous transitions 
between the two principal sorts of spines. In the non-scandent species true claws 
are very scarce, very imperfect, or wholly absent, 
Calamus Oxleyanus is the only species known to me which is provided with a 
long and powerfully clawed cirrus at the extremity of the leaf, but nevertheless 
‘appears to be a non-scandent Palm. With this solitary exception, which (see observations 
on C. Oxleyanus) is perhaps not absolute, the non-scandent species of Calamus are 
almost exclusively armed with straight spines. C. erectus, for example, is densely be- 
set with long laminar spines on the leaf.sheaths, on the petiole and leaf.rachis and 
spathes, and only bears some small rudimentary claws on the tail-like appendix at 
the summit of the spadices. 
The spines which defend the leaf-sheaths are usually laminar, flat, elastic, more 
or less elongated, very sharp, often smooth and shining, light.coloured, brown or 
almost black or of the colour of the surface of the sheaths, solitary or scattered, 
or more or less confluent by their bases and seriate, or even disposed in annular 
horizontal or oblique rings or whorls; the spines near the mouth of the sheaths are 
often longer and more slender than the others. 
Frequently with the larger spines are intermingled smaller ones or even small 
wart-like pungent tubercles. In some species (C. platyacanthus, C. ornatus, C. palustris, 
etc.) the spines have a very broad base which is concave beneath and swollen above, 
where it is sharply separated by a definite line or narrow furrow from the laminar 
acuminate point. Sometimes in place of spines the sheaths bear brittle rigid. 
eriniform bristles, as in C. Muellerü, or small rigid hairs seated on a bulbous base, 
as in the species of the group of C. ciliaris; in these the hairs are usually deciduous 
with age or at a certain time separate from their bulbous permanent bases; these 
latter render scabrid the surface of the parts on which they are situated. In one 
variety of C. tenuis the bases of the spines are unusually extended laterally, while 
the points remain atrophied; and, as a few of these spines are aligned close together, 
their bases remain in contact right and left so as to form continuous, slightly raised, 
more or less oblique submembranous ridges across the sheaths. In C. corrugatus the 
surface of the sheaths is rendered uneven by the presence of merely annular raised 
wrinkles. Some spines when young have their margins fringed with a furfuraceous 
scurf. 
Very rarely the spines of sheaths are curved or hooked, and I recollect only C. 
javensis VAR. tenuissimus as a form in which they have a tendency to become so. 
The spines on the petioles, especially those near their base or along their margins, 
as well as those that sometimes occur on the first or basilar spathe or on the rachis 
of certain leaves are usually less laminar, thicker and stronger than those of the leaf- 
sheaths. : 
Very peculiar are the spines of C. tomentosus, which consist of small black points 
rising from the centre of small mamillate swellings or tubercles, Very curious too 
are the spines of the leaf-sheaths of O. radulosus and O. spathulatus, which instead 
of being, as is usually the casé with the ^ spines of leaf-sheaths, horizontal or 
deflexed, are ascending, semiconic, short, thick, fiat beneath and have a distinct 
axillary swelling at the base in their upper part. | ibo | 
