146 ANNALS OF THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN, CALCUTTA. [C. castaneus 
in full-grown leaves) very densely armed with flat, very acuminate, often sinuous, 
dark-grey spines which are as much as 6-7 cm. long and are intermingled with 
smaller ones of the same shape. eaves not cirriferous, large, 1°5-2 m. long; petiole 
very stout and long (60-70 em.), 2 em, thick, faintly channelled at the base and 
flat upwards above, where more or less armed with straight erect spines, rounded 
underneath where armed along the middle with straight horizontal spines and on the 
margins with the same kind of straight, long and closely set spines pointing in 
different directions and intermixed with much shorter ones; rachis in the 
intermediate and upper portion trigonous, acutely bifaced and smooth above, 
roundish near the base below, where armed with distant solitary, short, horizontal 
or slightly deflexed spines, flat and unarmed near the apex; leaflets green on 
both surfaces, slightly paler beneath, numerous, equidistant, alternate or subopposite 
(at least in the portions seen), narrowly lanceolate or broadly ensiform, somewhat 
narrowed at the base, gradually acuminate to a spinulous apex; mid-costa acute 
above, bearing on both surfaces, mainly towards the apex, few short bristly 
spinules; secondary nerves 2-3 on each side of the  mid-eosta, rather distinct 
and naked on both surfaces, margins finely and acutely spinulous, transverse veinlets 
indistinct; the largest leaflets 60 cm. long and 4-5:5 cm. broad; the terminal pair 
smaller than the others. Male spadiz . . . . . Female spadiz not seen entire; 
partial inflorescences about 40 cm. long, bearing 7-8 spikelets on each side; 
secondary spathes thinly coriaceous,  elongate-infundibuliform, loosely sheathing, 
unarmed, prolonged into a lanceolate-auriculiform limb, ultimately withered and 
decayed at the apex, but not fibrous; spikelets large and thick, 12-17 cm. long, 
spreading, furnished with a peduncular part 1-2 cm. long, by which they are 
attached inside and at the bottom of their own spathe; spathels covered with a very 
thin adherent brown indumentum, broadly and symmetrically infundibuliform, and 
having a rather loose entire or later irregularly split limb, which is prolonged at 
one side into a triangular ultimately decayed point; involucrophorum spathaceous, 
irregularly split, attenuate at the base, attached inside and at the bottom of its own 
spathel, flattish and two-keeled on the side next to the axis; involucre not or 
slightly exceeding the invojucrophorum, subcupular, more or less irregularly split ; 
areola of the neuter flower vertically ovate and acute, Female flowers 5 mm. long. 
Fruiting perianth not pedicelliform; its calyx not thickened or callous at the base, 
entirely split into three lanceolate acuminate lobes; the segments of the corolla 
scarcely longer than the calyx; filaments with stamens highly connate at the base 
and in the free portion elongately triangular, Fruit ellipsoid, ovate or obovate, 
rounded at the base and suddenly narrowed at the top into a rather long beak, 13 
mm. broad and 22-24 mm. long (including the beak), of uniform chestnut-brown 
or chocolate colour; scales small, in 24-27 longitudinal series, about 2 mm. 
broad. and scarcely less in length, narrowly channelled along the middle, dull 
and under a strong lens finely scabridulous, with slightly paler, finely erose margins 
and obtuse tip. Seed not seen perfectly mature. The plant acquires in drying a 
reddish-brown colour. 
HasrraT.— The “Malayan Peninsula; in* thick jungles about Malacca (Grifith, 
Maingay No. 1533 in H. K.) and in the district.of Perak on the hills of Larut 
between 150-200 metres above the level of the sea (Herb, Cale. No. 5880). is 
