204 82. PALM^. [Calavmis. 



Ovary incompletely 3-celled, covered with retrorse scales; stig- 

 mas 3. Fruit globose or ellipsoid, clothed with deflexed, polished 

 scales. Seed smooth or pitted. Albumen equable or ruminate. 



C. Thwaitesii, Becc. Fl. Br. I. 0. 441. Common in the evergreen 

 forests at the foot of the Nilkund ghat of North Kanara. In flower and 

 fruit Feb., Mch. Scandent. This species or a closely allied one is common 

 near the sea-coast at Marmagoa. Sir J. Hooker remarks on specimens of 

 this plant sent to Kew in the Fl. Br. 1.6. 445, under C. pse^ido-temiis, Becc. 

 There is a species common in North Kanara on the Ainshi ghat, also in 

 the ravines rear Kadra, Avhich was referred to C. fiagellutn, Griff', at Kew. 

 It has, however, an equable albumen, deeply foveolate, surrounded with a 

 brown spongy covering. The outside of the fruit is as in the description 

 in the Fl. Br. I. G. 439. Fl. Fr. C. & H. seasoiis. 



• C. pseudo-tenuis, Becc. MSS. Fl. Br. I. 0. 445, Common on the 

 Sapa ghats of North Kfinara. Fl. Mch., Apl. Fr. July. The minute male 

 flowers in short, decurved spikelets and the small, beaked, brown fruit are 

 characteristic. 



C. Rotang, Linn. Sp. PI. Ed. 1. 325 ; Ed. 2. 463 ; Fl. Br. I. G. 447 ; 

 C.Boxhnrfjliii, Ginff". Palms Brit. Ind. 55, t. 195. Deccan peninsula 

 •and Ceylon, Fl. Br. I. That this species is indigenous in the ghats or 

 elsewhere in the Bombay Presidency is doubtful. Brandis says western 

 ghats and valleys of the Satpudas, but it is doubtful whether he ever saAv 

 specimens of C Rotang, L., from either the Bombay ghats or the Bombay 

 Satpudas. Dalzell and. Gibson and Graham give Linnaeus' name of C. 

 Rotang to what the natives call ' Bet.' which includes several species. 

 There are several species undescribed from North Kanara, and furflier 

 research will no doubt bring to light a number of others. The genus 

 Calamus is difficult, as it is not always easy to match the 'male flowers and 

 fruit of the same species. The cane brakes are generally in remote places, 

 and so profusely armed that they are with difficulty entered. The flowers 

 of some species appear at long intervals and during the rainy season or 

 just at the beginning of the monsoon. 



Ordee 83. GRAMINE-ai. 



Herbs, rarely shrubs or trees. Leaves* alternate, distichous, 

 consisting of a tubular split sheath and a narrow linear blade joined 

 to the sheath by a petiole (in bamboos) ; sheath terminating in a 

 scarious or fringed ligule. Flowers hermaphrodite or unisexual, 

 arranged in distichous 1 or many flowered spikelets, usually with 

 1-2 empty glumes (bracts) at the base. The flowering axis bears 

 1 or more distichous glumes (flowering glumes). Each flowering 

 glume bears in its axil the palea, a transparent 2-nerved or keeled 

 bract. The flowering glume embraces the palea with its incurved 

 edges. Between the flowering glume and the palea is situated the 

 flower, consisting of 2, 3 small scales (lodicules) 3 or more free 

 stamens and the superior ovary, crowned with 2 plumose stigmas. 



