THE PALMS OF BRITISH INDIA AND CEYLON. 983 



length of 2 oi* 3 inches beyond the flowers, is also enveloped by 

 these bracts. Flowers larger than the male flowers, 1 inch in 

 diameter, globose. Sepals fleshj^, reniform, imbricate ; petals 

 smaller, convolute ; staminodes 6-9. Ovary subtrigonous, 

 (3-4-celled) celled ; stigmas sessile, reciTrved. 



Fruit a drupe, when young pretty distinctly trigonous, l)ut 

 when old, the pulp round the pyrenes so swells as to give the 

 fruit the appearance of an almost perfect globe, 6-8 inches in 

 diametet, seated on the greatly enlarged perianth, Pyrenes 3-1, 

 obcordate, fibrous outside ; endosperm horny, hollow ; mesocarp 

 fleshy and fibrous. 



Germination. — A¥hen the nuts begin to germinate, the space 

 within the kernel fills up with a cream coloured substance of the 

 consistency of cheese\ From this the root of the germ or young- 

 plant protrudes, through that end of the nut which was attached 

 to the spadix, the body or actual stem of the plant following, until 

 the two first leaflets are thrown up with the shell of the nut attach- 

 ed. All these parts are, when very young, beautifully incased 

 in an entire leathery substance like the sheaths of the spadix. 

 These seedlings are called ' dantalas' or ' kelingoos'. 



Each of these little trees has 1-4 rootlets attached to it. The 

 lower part of the stem, where those roots are attached, resembles 

 much that end of a carrot, parsnip or radish to which the crop is 

 attached ; and indeed the plant altogether looks very like an in- 

 verted long parsnip. 



These dantalas, which are found beneath the surface, are about 

 1 inch thick at the lower part and taper off to a mere point, being* 

 12-15 inches long. A slit or groove runs from near the bottom 



^ For the chemical aspect of the process of germination, see: Gatin, C L., Con- 

 tribution a Tetude chimique de la germination du Borassus flabelliformis L., in 

 Bull. Soc Bot. de France (1905), -Ith series, vol. v., pp. 558-.jf)l. 



By the same author : Xouvelle contribution a I'etude chimique de la germina- 

 tion du Borassus flabelliformis, L.in Rev. Gen. Hot. Paris, 18 (1906), 481.-483. 



Besides : Recherches anatomiques et chimiques sur la germination des palmiers. 

 Paris, 1906, pp 307-308. 



Transformation diastasique du mannose en glucose au cours de la germination 

 du Borassus flabelliformis, L., in Bull. Soc. Bot. de France, vol. 55 0908), pp. 383- 

 386. 



