740 THE SUBDIVISIONS OF THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 



Alliance XXXIII. — Spadicifloras. 

 Families: Palmacece, Aroidece. 



Monocotyledons with small and usuall^^ unisexual flowers crowded on spikes or 

 spadices, and inclosed in one or more conspicuous sheaths, the sj^athes. The ovaries 

 are superior. 



This alliance may be contrasted with the group Compositfe of Dicotyledons in 

 which also the individual flowers are merged in dense crowded inflorescences which 

 superficially resemble single flowers (cf. Arum and Chrysanthemum). 



Palm,acece. — Include plants with cylindrical, woody stems and tough fan-shaped 

 or feather-like leaves of large dimensions having a plaited vernation. The flowers 

 are borne in branched, fleshy spikes often inclosed in large sheathing leaves; they 

 are hermaphrodite or unisexual and actinomorphic; the parts are arranged in threes, 

 and are inconspicuous. The gynseceum consists of three carpels, each containing 

 one seed. Stamens six, pollen dust-like. Fruits are berries, drupes, and nuts, and 

 contain three, or by suppression, one seed. The endosperm is copious, and generally 

 hard and stony. The majority of Palms possess upright, columnar caudices sur- 

 mounted by a huge tuft of crowded leaves (cf. vol. i. p. 289, and PI. VIII.). In 

 several species the caudex attains a height of 30 metres, and in one (Ceroxylon 

 andicola) 57 metres. The Climbing Palms have slender branched stems, and by 

 the aid of the hooks on their leaves mount to the summit of trees and stretch like 

 lianes from crown to crown (cf. vol. i. pp. 363, 675, and 676). The stems of these 

 Palms reach a length of 150-200 metres, and yield the rotang cane. The opposite 

 figure shows the interior of a forest penetrated by Climbing Palms and two natives 

 rolling the stems into a coil. Old Palm-stems are either smooth and show the scars 

 of the fallen leaves, or they still bear the disintegrated fragments of former foliage- 

 leaves. Others again are armed with spiny girdles and scales. The leaves are 

 folded in bud and undivided, and as they unfold they split along the creases, and 

 the blade is divided pinnately or like a fan; we may distinguish between the 

 feather-leaved and fan-leaved Palms. Often in young Palms the leaf splits at tlie 

 apex into two pointed lobes only, as in Areca disticha, represented the foreground 

 of fig. 420. The dimensions of Palm-leaves and the gigantic inflorescence of the 

 Talipot Palm {Corypha umbraculifera) have already been alluded to (cf. vol. i. pp. 

 287 and 745). In Oreodoxa regia the sheathing base of the leaf attains a length of 

 2 metres and a half. The fruits of many species (e.g. Ghamcerops excelsa) are borne 

 in grape-like bunches; in others they attain to great size and weight. The Double 

 Cocoa-nut, the fruit of Lodoicea Sechellarum, is prominent in this respect (cf. 

 p. 452). 



Most Palms are eminently tropical in their distribution. Some genera are met 

 with throughout the tropics, others (e.g. Mauritia, Oreodoxa, and Iriartea) are 

 confined to the New World; others again, as Borassus (B. flabelliforviis, PI. VIII.). 

 Raphia, Caryota, and Calamus to the Old. Chamcerops humilxs, alone of tlie 



