THE SPIKELETS. 5 
The involucre of the female flower is often formed by a kind of pedicel raised 
above the involucrophorum (Pl. I, f. 1, 7, d), and terminating in a flat, nearly 
circular superficies which is the scar left by the fallen flowers; this scar is surrounded 
only by an excessively narrow ridge in such a fashion that all the parts which should 
support the flowers seem to want every foliaceous appendicular part. This is very 
marked in the species of the groups of D. Hystrix aud D. mirabilis; at times 
the involuere is evolved asymmetrically or unilaterally and assumes almost the 
shape of an ear, because the areola of the neutral flower is situated on the most 
developed side, and thus rendered very conspicuous; this occurs in D. geniculatus, 
D. acanthobolus, D. scapigerus, D. periacanthus, D. longispathus. The involucre of the 
female flower of D. cristatus is also singular, borne as it is in a strangely oblique 
manner by the involucrophorum, and then prolonged on one side at the margin into 
a kind of small pedicel, which carries the sterile flower. | 
The female spikelets of D. ruptilis have quadrifarious flowers, and the same 
may be said of D, sparsiflorus; but, in any case, the female flowers are bifarious and 
more or less distichous, though often with a tendency to be unilateral. The spathels 
are large, spathaceous and amplectent in D. rupis, amd infundibuliform in D. lengi- 
spathus, as in a typical Calamus (Pl. 1I, f. 8, 10). The involucrophorum has a pedicellar 
part and is infundibuliform in D. ruptilis (exactly as in a Calamus); in D. Hystriz, 
D. Korihalsii, and D.  Gaudichaudi it is callous in the axilla; but in most of the 
Daemonorops the involucrophorum has lost its appendicular nature to assume the axial. 
The involucre of the female spikelets, though in most Daemonorops it has & 
form peculiar to itself, is nevertheless in D. longispathus indistinguishable from that of 
a Calamus, and in JD. rupitilis has, as in several Calami, a pedicellar and also an 
infundibular part. In D. Treubianus, D. Sepal, D. pinangianus, and D. petiolaris a 
small callosity is formed at the axil of the involucre together with the axis. 
The areola of the sterile flowers (Pl. I, f. 1, 7, d; Pl. II, f. 8, 10, e) is found 
in Daemonorops as in Calamus, for as in the latter the female flowers are accompanied 
by a neuter or sterile flower. Only in D. Kunstlerii have I found no trace of an 
areola, the sterile flower being, as it would appear, also wanting. In certain species 
the areola is very indistinct, being represented by a small punctiform pit, while in 
other cases it is as clearly defined as in the Calami. 
In the species of group of D. Draco, iu D. didymophyllus, D. Riedelianus, 
D. geniculatus, D. acanthobolus, but especially in D. longispathus, the areola is ovate, and 
very clearly circumscribed by raised margins, just as in a typical Calamus (Pl. II, 
f. 8, 10, e). The shape of the areola in the species of the group Cymbospatha is 
also peculiar. In these the scar of the sterile flower is surrounded (though in the 
greater number on the upper side only) by a semi-circle (at times a double one) 
so tumescent as to simulate a nectary (Pl. I, f. 7, g”). 
In D. cristatus a true areola is wanting, because a neutral flower is borne 
laterally upon a sub-pedieelliform prolongation of the margin of the involucre. 
