PALMED 389 



encircle the stem and give to it its familiar and peculiar 

 ringed appearance. 



Another difference which we may notice is that in 

 the leaf scar are a very large number of dots (the 

 scars of the vascular bundles), far more than we ever 

 find in the leaf scar of a dicotyledonous plant. This 

 shows that a large number of vascular bundles enter 

 the leaf from the stem. 



The leaves of the Coco-nut are very large and pin- 

 nately compound. Each leaflet is very tough, long and 

 narrow, and has a number of veins running along its 

 length, with smaller cross veins. The midrib is much 

 thicker, and at the base the leaflet appears to be folded 

 downwards along it. In these respects the leaves of 

 the Coco-nut are utterly different from those of ordinary 

 trees ; there is indeed, no real resemblance between 

 them and ordinary pinnate leaves. (See p. 392). 



Flowers unisexual and monoecious, the staminate and 

 the ovary flowers, on the same panicle ; branches of the 

 panicle rather thick, with the younger flowers sunk slight- 

 ly in them, and the whole enclosed when young inside 

 two or more bracts spathes with other smaller bracts. 



Staminate flowers unsymmetrical, with three small 

 valvate sepals and three petals, both sepals and petals 

 being very thick, leathery and shining, Stamens six, 

 anthers linear, opening by two slits, and with some- 

 times an undeveloped ovary. Ovary flowers larger 

 and with no stamens, only a three-celled ovary. Fruit, 

 a hard nut surrounded by a fibrous substance and 

 enclosed in a tough skin (epicarp). 



The white substance which forms inside the nut as 

 it ripens is the endosperm ; this is hard and oily, 



