924 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HLST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXI. 



ness, much larger than in its native land ; the forked branches 

 Skve more numerous Ibut shorter and more closely grown ; the 

 enormous fan-leaves are much larger, more abundant and more 

 solid ; and even the flowers and fruit, so far as my memory served 

 me, seemed to be finer and more abundant. At any rate, the 

 whole habit of the tree had so greatly changed in the hothouse 

 climate of Ceylon that the inherited physiognomy of the tree had 

 lost vuBXij of its most characteristic features. And all this was 

 the result of a change of external conditions and consequent adap- 

 tation, more particularly of the greater supply of moisture which had 

 been brought to bear, from its earliest youth, on a plant accustomed 

 to the dry desert climate of North Africa. These splendid trees 

 had been raised from Egyptian seed, and in twenty years had 

 grown to a height of thirty feet." (A Visit to Ceylon, p. 180.) 



Illustration. — Not having at our disposal a good photograph 

 of an Egyptian Doum Palm growing in India, we reproduce on 

 Plate XXXV a photograph of some characteristic specimens Avhich 

 grow at Shaikh Hammed, near the ruins of Athribis and Dair- 

 el-Abiadh in Egypt. 



LATANIA, COMM., Juss. Gen. 39. 



(After the vernacular name "Latanier" of Latania hurhonica, 

 Lam., now Livistona chinensis, R. Br.). 



Gaertn. Fruct. II, 185, t. 120.— Jacq. Fragm. t. 8.— Mart. 

 Hist. Nat. Palm. Ill, 222, t. 148.— Illustr. Hort, t. 229.— Baker 

 Fl. Maurit, 380.— Benth. & Hook. Gen. PI. III. II, 940, 118. 



Of moderate height ; leaves long-petioled, palmate-flabelliform ; 

 blade deeply laciniated. 



DicECious. — Flo^vers in distichously-branched axillary spadices, 

 «ach branch sheathed by an obliquel}^ truncate spathe. Male : Spikes 

 cylindrical, with pits formed by the union of imbricating bracts, 

 each pit containing a single flower ; perianth-lobes imbricate ; 

 stamens 15-30, exserted ; filaments connate at the base; pistillode 

 a tricjuetrous column or of 3 or more subulate processes. Female : 

 Bracts toothed on their outer edge, combined in pairs to form a cup 

 for each flower ; flowers fewer than in the male spikes ; staminodes 

 forming a toothed cup ; ovary 3-celled ; stigmas 3, distinct. 



