THE PALMS OF BRITISH INDIA AND CEYLON. 883 



Chamaerops palmetto, Mich. Fl. Bor. Am. I^ 206 (1803).— Willcl. Spec. 

 PI. IV, pt. II, 1158.— Mchx. f . Hist. Arb. Am. II, 186, t. 10.— Pursh, Fl. 

 Am. Sept. I, 240.— Nuttal, Gen. I, 231.— Elliot, Sk. I, 431.— Spreng. Syst. 

 II, 137.— Croom, Am. Joiirn. Sc. XXVI, 315— London, Arb. Brit. IV 

 2532. 



Names, — Cabbage Palmetto, Cabbage Tree, Pond Thatch, Pond 

 Top. 



Description. — A tree, with a trunk often 30-60 feet in height 

 and 2 feet in diameter, broken by shallow irregular interrupted 

 fissures into broad ridges, with a short pointed knob-like cavidex 

 surrounded by a dense mass of contorted roots, often 4 or 5 feet in 

 diameter, and 5 or 6 feet deep, from which tough light orange- 

 coloured-roots, often nearly ^ inch in diameter, covered with thick 

 loose rind easily broken into narrow fibres, and furnished with short 

 slender brittle rootlets, penetrate the soil for a distance of 15 or 20 

 feet, and crowned with a broad head of leaves which are at first up- 

 right, then spread nearly at right angles with the stem, and are finally 

 pendulous. Leaves suborbicular with numerous segments (as many 

 as 80 in cultivated specimens) measuring 4^-4f feet from the 

 apex of the petiole to the end of the central segment ; petiole 

 apparently a little longer than the limb, robust, at the apex 1-lf 

 inches broad and plain or slightly concave above and convex 

 below ; ligule lanceolate or lanceolate-acuminate ; rhachis stout 

 winged at the base on both sides, curved and prolonged almost to 

 the apex of the leaf. The central apical segments are much 

 smaller than those in the middle of the sides. All the segments, 

 inckided the outermost ones, are deeply bipartite, finely striated 

 with numerous distinct secondary and tertiary nerves, of the same 

 colour on both sides ; primary and secondary sinuses provided with 

 a distinct filament. Spadices forming large compound panicles 

 as long as, or longer than, the leaves, nutant whilst in flower and 

 curved-reflexed when in fruit ; partial inflorescences forming 

 secondary panicles of l-l^ feet in length, the upper ones even 

 shorter, each one divided into 6-10 alternately distichous 

 branches j spathes of the partial inflorescences narrowly sheathing, 

 tubular-infundibuliform, brown and dry in the terminal part, very 

 finely striate, entire and obliquely truncate where they open, 

 11 



