THE PALMS OF BRITISH INDIA AND CEYLON. 463 



Perandeniya. In the lower part of the stem the rings are not 

 visible owing to a thick crust of lichens. 



BENTINCKIA NICOBARICA, Becc. lUustraz. di ale. Palme viv. nel 

 Giard. di Buitenz. 165. Hook. Fl. Brit. Ind. VI, 418 ; Brandis Ind. Trees, 

 647. — Orania nicobarica, Kurz in Journ. Bot. IV, p. 331, t. 171, f . 19-25. 



Description. — Trunk tall, 60-70 feet high, 9 inches in diameter, 

 annulate. Leaves 5-8 feet ; leaflets ^-2 feet, sessile, linear, cria- 

 ceous, tip obtusely 2-lobed; petiole short; rhachis glabrous. 



Spadix l|^-2 feet long, decompoiuad, glabrous, branches and 

 branchlets inserted in woolly grooves of the rhachis; bracteoles 

 densely villous within. Female flowers: sepals and petals subsimilar, 

 broadly ovate, obtuse, shining. 



Fruits tristichously arranged, globose, 1 inch long, scarlet. 

 Seed ovoid-oblong, ventrally flat, dorsally convex, rugosely ribbed ; 

 albumen equable; embryo lateral and apical. 



Habitat. — Nicobar Islands, Kamorta. Common, associated with 

 Areca catechu, Pinancja Manii, and Ftycliora'pMs aucjusta. 



Illustration : Plate LVI — The photograph, taken by Rev. 

 M. Maier, S.J., shows a young plant of Bentinckia nicobarica, 

 growing at the Lower Gate entrance to Government House Gardens, 

 Malabar Point, Bombay. It was planted by Mr. Millard in 1903, 

 and has, therefore, 9 years growth by this time. 



