368 JQXIRNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL BIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXI. 



excavated nor gibbous ; stigma bilabiately 3-parted into 3 short 

 lobes. (Fig. 21.) 



■ Fig; 21. — Flowers of WasMngtonia robusta, Wendl. 

 X 3-5 (After Parish). 



The fruit ovoid, black, shining, with little fleshy mesocarp, 

 about ^ inch long, and ^ inch broad, terminated by the perma- 

 nent setiform style. Seed ovate, by -^-^-J^ inch long and 

 about 1 inch broad, very slightly incavato-umbilicate on the side 

 of the raphe. 



The flowers are copiously nectariferous, and exhale a heavy 

 odour, disagi'eeable when near by, but when diftused somewhat 

 suggestiveof the perfume of orange blossoms. 



Beccari sustains the specific rank of this palm on the following 

 three characters : — 



(ct) The lobal filaments of the stamens tuberculately enlarged at 

 the coherejit base and abruptly subulate above, 



(h) The stigma bilabiately 3-parted into 3 short lobes. 



(c) The ovary turbinate at the summit, but not excavated and 

 not gibbous. 

 . "The first two characters," says Parish, •" hold in the flowers of 

 Californian trees which have been referred here, so far as concerns 

 the few specimens I have examined. The ovarian character i& less 

 satisfactory." 



Habitat. — Borders of the Colorado desert of Southern California, 

 at low altitudes, seldom exceeding 1,100 feet. 



