596 Introduction of large Palms into Hot-houses. 



A most splendid plant, with brilliant scarlet flowers ; remarkable for the 

 great length and attenuated form of its pseudo-bulbs ; which, with the pecu- 

 liar form of its flowers, made it first considered to be a Cattleya, " till J. 

 Bateman, Esq., upon a closer examination of some flowers unfolded at Kny- 

 persly, discovered its proper affinity with Laelia." {Paxton's Mag. of Bot., 

 October.) 



Art. III. On a new Method of introducing Palms of large Size into 

 Hot-houses. By Dr. John Lhotsky, F.H.S., of Bavaria, &c. 



(Read before the Botanical Society of London, Sept. 6. 1839.) 



During my stay in Vienna, in the year 1829, a plan was laid down by M. 

 Charles Ritter (author of A Journey to St. Domingo) and myself, for intro- 

 ducing large palm trees into Europe. It was, in the first instance, based 

 upon the physiological fact, that the fibre, and the bundles of fibres, in these 

 plants are possessed of a high degree of vegetative power, or vitality. If a 

 palm tree, even of a certain age, gets injured at any height of the stem ; for 

 example, its bark being shaved or taken off, the fibre protrudes outside, as- 

 sumes the appearance and nature of roots, and hangs out from the surface of 

 the trunk. If a palm is^ cut off below such a beard, as it were, of fibres, 

 and planted, it will very easily grow ; nay, I observed afterwards, in the Bra- 

 zils, a still more striking proof of this assertion. The Diplothemium is a palm 

 which does not grow more than 18 ft. high. The lower part of its trunk 

 is round and smooth, but the upper square and curiously shaped. The pe- 

 duncles 'of the old leaves break off rather long, and remain on the trunk for 

 nearly two thirds of its height. These rudiments of leaves being large, and 

 covered with spines, afford a superior material for forming hedges around plant- 

 ations ; the tree is cut off a little under this spiny part, planted, and grows 

 very easily. 



According to the above plan, I began, in April, 1831, at Bahia, the execu- 

 tion of the commission which had been intrusted to me. Eight different 

 species of palms were collected for that purpose, viz. Cocas nucifera, two 

 specimens, with stems 20ft, long, ot about 3001b. weight each; Elae^is 

 guineensis (Dende), one specimen, of the same size and weight as the 

 former ; Attalia funifera (Pia^aba), collected .50 miles up the Bay, rather 

 larger in size than the former ; Attalia sp. (Pati), from the same locality, 

 about 18 ft. high, but rather slender, &c. 



It is not required, on the present occasion, to state the difficulties which 

 I encountered, having to work with uncultivated negroes, in savage and dif- 

 ficult localities. Several of the palms had a weight of from 300 lb. to 5001b. 

 It was required to dig out a considerable portion of the roots, without shak- 

 ing off the earth from the fibres. In some of the palms, for example, in Cocos 

 nucifera, the roots extended in a large circumference, say 5 ft. to 7 ft. The 

 outer full-grown leaves were all chopped off, and only the very tender and 

 recent ones were preserved. As soon as I had conveyed the trees home, the 

 remaining rudiments of the leaves were burned with red-hot iron, that the 

 sap might be prevented from oozing through the wounds. For the sake of 

 making this quite secure, they were moreover primed with a composition of 

 hot pitch and tar. As a precautionary measure against cold weather during 

 the sea voyage or afterwards, some cotton was laid around and over the 

 heart, over which, again, a thick layer of flax was properly secured. The 

 palms, thus prepared, were each laid horizontally in boxes, of which the 

 construction was this : — All the planks but those forming the bottom were 

 perforated by large holes ; the lids were adapted to opening, for proper in- 

 spection during the passage. At the root end of the boxes, a partition of 

 boards was inserted, merely admitting, through a hole cut for that purpose, 

 the passage of the stem ; and this minor division was, after the trees were 



