SPECIES OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, 37 
The native generic names for Calamus are numerous. Besides the universally 
known name of Rotang, we have the following :— , 
Uri, in Ternate; 
Boucan, in Makassar; 
Ua, in Banda and Amboina; 
Bejuco (a Spanish name), in the Philippines; 
Penjalin, Hoéh and Hooek (Huyk), in Java; 
Khóe and Khiéea, in China; 
Máy, in Cochin China; 
Bét, in Hindustani; 
Vetra and Vetus, in Sanskrit. 
As a philological curiosity I may suggest that apparently the names of many climbing 
plants, and especially of such as are employed for the purposes of tying and 
binding, like the Latin * Vitis,” the Italian '*Vetrice " (Ligustrum), '**Vimine" and 
* Vinco” and the Latin “Juncus,” the Anglo-Saxon *'Welig," the English * Willow," 
etc. may have a common origin with the Sanskrit name for Calamus. 
XXII.—Note on the Species of Calamus of the Philippine Islands. 
Father Blanco in his “Flora de Filipinas” published in the year 1837 has 
given a very incomplete description of four. species of Calamus, growing in these 
islands and named ©.. mollis, C. gracilis, C. maximus and C, usitatus. Besides these, 
three other Calami are mentioned, namely C. Curag, the Calamus of the island of 
Negros, and another with the native name of “ Limoran.” As there are no authentic 
specimens left of any of the plants of Blanco, we must be content, in trying to 
identify the species above noted, to work with only Blanco’s descriptions. 
C. mollis is apparently a common species in the Philippines for it has been met 
with again and again by all modern botanists and we may consider its identifica- 
tion as assured. 
C. gracilis had. its name changed to C. Blancot by Kunth owing to the name 
gracilis having already been applied by Roxburgh to an Indian species. There is, it 
is true, no sufficient evidence that C. Bluncoi of Kunth, to which have been referred 
the specimens of a Calamus distributed by Cuming imdát No. 1225, exactly corre- 
sponds with  Blanco's plant; in tue absence, however, of any type specimens we 
‘can agree to accept them as the same. 
€, maximus I have found to be a local variety of C. ornatus Blume, and C, usiía- 
ius has been reduced by me to Daemonorops Gaudichaudit Mart. 
C. Curag Miq., which is stated by Blanco to grow on Mount Angat, and to 
be a non-seandent plant, is not recognizable from the brief statement in which it 
was published by its author. 
The Calamus of the Island of Negros is said to have black stems used in 
making walking canes and in the Novissima Appendix to the ‘Flora de Filipinas’ 
p. 276, it has been reduced to C. Scipionum var. maculatus ; but the only thing, I 
believe, that is certain about it, is that it is a quite different species from 
0, Scipionum. 
