350 ANNALS OF THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN, CALCUTTA. [C. vitiensis 
190. CALAMUS vitrensis Warb. MSS, (name only in the Berlin Herbarium). - 
DrscripTion.—Scandent, slender or of moderate size (Weber).  Leaf-sheaths e . 
. . . Leaves 1-1'°2 m. long (Weber), apparently cirriferous; leaflets not numerous, 
very inequidistant and remote, nof fascicled, alternate or subopposite, thinly 
papyraceous or subherbaceous, green even when dry, concolorous on both surfaces, 
explanate, lanceolate, almost equally narrowed .to both ends, inserted at a rather acute 
angle and not callous at their upper axilla, not very long-acuminate at the summit 
into a not very acute tip, with 5 very slender costae completely naked on both 
surfaces; transverse veinlets short, not very close together and much interrupted ; 
margins very acute, quite smooth except very near the summit, where finely 
spinulous; the largest leaflets, the lowest ot a terminal portion (the only one seen 
by me), 22-25 cm. long and 35-36 mm, broad, the others gradually shorter, the 
uppermost very small (8 cm. long, 17 mm. broad); rachis acutely bifaeed above, 
flattish beneath, where armed at intervals of 2-3 em. with half-whorls of relatively 
strong not very acuminate black-tipped claws. Male spadir , . . . . Female 
spadiz not very elongate, rather  stout, with few partial inflorescences; primary 
spathes tubular, not very closely sheathing, thinly coriaceous, the lowest amongst 
those extant in the specimen seen by me, but not actually the first, cylindraceous 
truncate at the mouth, prolonged at one side into a short triangular point, this 
slightly keeled and with a few scattered small tuberculiform spinules on the back 
upper primary spathes gradually smaller, cylindraceous, striate, ultimately decayed but 
pot filamentose at the mouth, quite unarmed, suddenly narrowed at their base 
into a slender, unarmed, flattened, sub-biconvex and acutely edged axial portion; 
the intermediate spathes about 15 cm. long and 10-12 mm. broad in their larger 
 gheatbing portion; partial inflorescences not very diffuse, panicled, arising erect from 
their respective spathes and then spreading, arched or recurved, their axis robust at 
the base, slender and filiform at the summit, rather short with many very approxi- 
mate subtrifarious or (at least at the base) not exactly distichous spikelets, which 
very suddenly decrease in length from the base of the inflorescence to its summit; 
secondary spathes short, tubular, infundibuliform or cyathiform, loosely sheathing, . 
unarmed, finely striate, horizontally truncate and entire at the mouth, not or slightly 
apiculate at one side; spikelets inserted outside the mouth of their own spathe with 
a rather distinct axillary callus, their axis slender, rigid and narrowing towards the 
summit, arched, patent, horizontal or deflexed; the lower ones, the largest, 6-7 em. 
long with 13-15 flowers on each side; the uppermost very small with 1—2 flowers 
cnly; spathels very narrow at their base with a suddenly enlarged, shortly infundi- 
buliform, striolate, truncate, entire, not or slightly apiculate limb; involucrophorum 
laterally attached near the base of the spathel above its own, distinctly pedicellate 
in the lower part of the spikelets, subsessile towards their summit, orbicular- 
disciform with a narrow entire limb  involuere flat, also orbicular-disciform and as 
large as the inyolucrophorum; areola of the neuter flower depressed, callous; the 
flowers are not always perfectly bifarious in one plane but are slightly assurgent 
on the subscorpioid spikelets. Fruiting perianth pedicelliform; the calyx shortly 
tubular with a quite flat base and 3 broadly triangular spreading lobes; the 
segments of the corolla slightly narrower than the lobes of the calyx and as long 
as these. Fruit apparently globular and about 1 cm. broad; ` scales rather 
