472 A NATURALIST IN THE PACIFIC CHAP, 



specimen showing the seeds germinating in the berries on the 

 plant. 



Several cases of this kind came under my notice in Fiji. Pulpy 

 fruits rather favour the precocious germination of seeds. Thus I 

 sometimes found the seeds germinating in the Mandarin orange 

 and in the Papaw fruit (Papaya) shortly after they had been 

 gathered. But more interesting examples were displayed in those 

 instances where the seed was found germinating on the plant. 

 When the Convolvulaceae grew in wet situations, as on the borders 

 of a mangrove swamp, the seeds were sometimes observed germi- 

 nating in the capsule. This came under my notice with Ipomea 

 glaberrima (Boj.) and with I. peltata, more particularly in wet 

 weather. With some other plants, like Hibiscus diversifolius, that 

 grow in wet places, this at times occurs. A species of Croton, 

 employed as a support for the Vanilla plants in a plantation near 

 Suva, displayed seeds germinating on the plant. I was informed 

 that the seeds of the common cultivated LufTa (L. cylindrica) 

 growing in a garden on Vanua Levu sometimes germinated in the 

 fruit still attached to the parent. It is possible that the seeds of the 

 parasitical genus, Myrmecodia, may occasionally germinate on the 

 plant,since I found them germinating inside some of the small berries 

 that had been lying forgotten within a newspaper for a fortnight. 



Perhaps the most curious case of abnormal vivipary observed 

 by me in Fiji was that concerned with the Coco-nut palm. Though 

 not known to many residents in the island, this habit was described 

 to me by Mr. Matthew Simpson, a planter on Vanua Levu, who 

 told me that he had noticed nuts germinating on the tree in 

 unusually dry seasons. Coco-nut palms displaying the nuts germi- 

 nating on the tree came under my observation near Bale-bale, 

 Savu-Savu Bay. In these cases the mature fruit, instead of falling, 

 remains attached and dries on the stalk. In one case the seedling 

 was about eighteen inches high. This seems to be what takes 

 place normally according to Blume with Nipa fruticans, the swamp 

 palm of Indo-Malaya. Goebel quotes this author to the effect that 

 the fruits are not separated from the head before germination is so 

 far advanced that sea-water can no longer injure the seedling. The 

 fruits, we are told, may remain for years attached in a state of 

 incomplete germination. 



Summary 



The scale of germinative capacity, that begins with the seedling 

 hanging from the branches of a mangrove like Rhizophora and 



