358 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXI. 



sand. A liberal supply of water is essential. Propagation is effect- 

 ed by seeds only. 



FRITCHARDIA PACIFICA, Seem, and H. Wendl. in Bonpl. IX 

 (1861) 260; X, 163, 310, t. 15.— Seem. Flora Vitiensis, 274, t. 79; in 

 'Correspond, relat. the Fiji Isl., p. 70. — Corypha umbraculifera, Forst. PI. 

 Bscul. 49 et Prodr., p. 88 {ex parte) (non Linn.) 



Names. — Vin, Sakiki, Niu Masei (in Viti) ; Bin (by the Ton 

 guese). 



Description. — The palm seldom obtains more than 30 feet 

 in height. Stem smooth, straight and nnarmed, at the base from 

 10-12 inches in diameter. The crown has a globular shape,, 

 and is composed of abont 20 leaves. Petioles unarmed, 3 feet 

 and more long and densely covered at the base with a mass of 

 brown fibres. Blade of the leaf rounded at the base, fan-shaped, 

 very large, and when young, as is the petiole, densely covered with 

 whitish-brown down, which, however, as the leaf advances in age, 

 gradually disappears. From the axils of the leaves arise flowers, 

 enveloped in several verj^ fibrous flaccid spathes, which rapidly 

 decay and have quite a ragged appearance even before the flowers 

 open. Spadix 3 feet long, stiff and very straight, flowers numer- 

 ous, minute, hermaphrodite, of a brownish-yellow colour. Fruit 

 perfectly round, about ^ inch in diameter ; when quite matured, it 

 has exactly the colour of a black-heart cherry ; the mesocarp has 

 a slight astringent taste. 



Habitat. — Islands of the Pacific : Vanua Levu, Viti Levuj 

 Tongan and Samoan Islands. 



Uses. — The leaves are made into fans, ' Iri masei' or ' Ai Viu,' 

 which (at Seemann's time) were only allowed to be used by the 

 chiefs, as those of the Talipot formerly were in Ceylon. The com- 

 mon people had to content themselves with fans made of Pan- 

 danus caricosus. " Hence, though there is not a village of im- 

 portance without the Sakiki, or, as it is termed in the Samosonio 

 dialect, which suppresses the letter k, Saii, there are never more 

 than one or two solitary specimens to be met with in any place, 

 the demand for the leaves being so limited, that they prove 



