274 



A TEXT-BOOK OF BOTANY 



feather palms (Fig. 271). The flower clusters are enor- 

 mous, each cluster enclosed at first in a huge bract, which 

 is often hard. In usefulness to man no monocotyle- 



donous family exceeds 

 the palms except the 

 grasses. Some of the 

 prominent species are 

 as follows: 



The coconut-palm 

 is the most widely 

 distributed palm, be- 

 ing found in all trop- 

 ical countries, and 

 never very far from 

 the sea, except as 

 planted by man (Fig. 

 272). Its slender 

 trunk, about two feet 

 in diameter, rises to 

 a height of sixty to 

 one hundred feet 

 and bears a crown 

 of downward curv- 

 ing pinnate leaves. 

 The coconut of com- 

 merce is well known. 



It is really a stone-fruit ( 143), in which the ovary wall 

 has ripened in two layers: the outer a fibrous husk, corre- 

 sponding to the flesh in a peach; the inner a heavy bony 

 layer. When on sale, the outer husk has usually been 

 stripped off, and at one end of the bony coat three round 

 black scars are seen, which indicate that the pistil is 

 made up of three carpels. All parts of the plant are 

 used, not only the nuts and the oil from them, but also the 

 leaves, the root, the sap of the young parts, etc. 



FIG. 271. A feather palm, closely related to the 

 date-palm. After ENGLER and PRANTL. 



