THE PALMS OF BRITISH INDIA AND CEYLON. 78 



sometimes to a distance of several yards before coming to the 

 surface.' " (Tliiselton-Dyer).' 



Fauvel" draws the attention to an interesting fact which came to 

 his notice through Mr. R. Dupont, Director of the Botanic Station 

 of the Se3'chelles. 



On examining a number of fruits one will discover that they 

 show a distinct dimorphism (cf. fig. 28). Those which have a deep 

 sinus in the middle of the two lobes (which gives them a nasty^ 

 appearance) are said to be female by the natives of the Seychelles, 

 whilst those with two parallel lobes and not having a sinus are 

 called male. The former are supposed to produce female trees, the 

 latter male."* 



J. Stanley Gardiner of the Exploring Mission Sealark, examined 

 over 300 nuts and found that both kinds of fruit are of about the 

 same number.' 



Flowers. — Lindley and Moore's " Treasury of Botany'', states 

 that only 30 years after germination the first flowers are produced. 



Waby reports^ that in March 1907 a thirteen year old speci- 

 men, kept in the Botanic Gardens of Georgetown, produced a spadix 

 with seven pistillate flowers. Two more spadices were produced 

 in the same year, two during the next, two more in 1909, and 

 one. in 1910.^ 



^ On the chemical side of germination cf. : 

 Thiselton-Dyer, 1. c, p. 228-229. 

 Gardiner, in Phil. Trans., R. S., 1883, p. 848. 

 ^ Fauvel, A. A. Note sur quelques points nouveaux de I'anatomie du Cocotier de 

 Mer, Locloicea SeyclieUarum. In Bull. Mus. Hist. Nat. XII (1906), 585-592. 

 '^ Clusius, in his ' Opusculum de Nuce Medica ' (Amstelodami, 1634), says of the 

 fruit : — " Facies nucis Medicae extrema pudendum muliebre et podicem 

 refert non impare magnitudine." 

 Fauvel tells us that the King of Bantam, who wished to make a present of a 

 nut to the Dutch Admiral Wolfart Harmansen, took care to remove the 

 upper part of the fruit in order not to offend the modesty of the famous 

 officer (p. 586, 1. c). 

 ^ Dupont, R., Curator of the Bot. Garden, Port- Victoria Mahe des Seychelles. 

 Lettre du 22 mai 1906, a son Excellence W. R. Davidson, Governor of the 

 Seychelles, transmise par ce dernier a M. Fauvel le 26 juin 1906. — 

 Published in Fauvel, 1. c. 591. 

 ^ Nature, No. 1891, vol. 73, January 25, 1906. The Percy Sladen Expedition 

 by H. M. S. " Sealark " to the Indian Ocean. The Seychelles Archipelago. 

 A letter in J. S. Gardiner, Zoological Laboratory, Cambridge, January 15, 

 1906. 

 For further notes on the fruit, vide : — 



(a) Swinburn Ward, in Gardner's Chronicle (1864), p- 294. 

 lb) W. Watson, eod. loco, (1886), p. 557. 



(c) Van Houtte's ' Flore des Serres et Jardins de I'Europe. Vol. XV 

 (1862-65), p. 168, No. 1427 : Le Cocotier des Seychelles, aver 

 2 figures. 

 *■ KewBull. (1910), p. 256. 



' Short notices of the flowering of these palms have been published in the 

 Reports of the Botanic Gardens, British Guiana, for the years 1906-7, p. 11, 

 1907-8, p. 10, 1908-9, p. 4. 



10 



