PREFACE. 15 



the foliage of this had a somewhat yellowish and 

 unhealthy appearance. The great heads of leaves then 

 began one by one to fall over, evidently from a rotting 

 of the stem at the 'neck.' They were removed, but 

 the mischief continued and eventually it became- 

 necessary ip sacrifice the whole plant." The disease- 

 was almost certainly due to the attacks of a fungus, 

 Melanoonium Pandani, which has been very destruc- 

 tive to Screw Pines in European Botanic Gardens. 



Aroids. 



Aroidece&re a well-marked order of plants represented 

 in our own flora by the '' Cuckoo-pint " of our hedge- 

 rows. Some 900 species are known, of which 360 are 

 cultivated at Kew. They vary in habit from terrestiai 

 herbs to tall climbers. A large proportion are tropical 

 and these have since 1863 been cultivated in No. I. 

 house, the architectural conservatory removed by 

 William TV. in 1836 from Buckingham Palace to serve 

 the purpose of a Palm House. 



Aiton, in the first edition of the Jforttus Kewensis 

 (1787) records 20 species ; the second (1813) gives 44 

 8is grown at Kew. Smith (Records, p. 92) enumerates 

 148 as in cultivation in 1864. In Appendix II. to the 

 Kew Report for 1877 a catalogue is given of 250 

 species and varieties. 



One species, without doubt the most remarkable of 

 the order, Amorphophallus Titanuni, is no longer in 

 the Kew collection. A full description of it is given 

 in the Bat Mag, (tt. 7153-5). 



