64 THE WEST AMEEICAN SCIENTIST. 



and the blade wavy something like Latania borbonica except that 

 the points are not drooping. In W. robusta the leaf is quite flat 

 and of a somewhat deeper shade, but no bluish or glaucous tint. 

 Geo. Such obtained the original seed — it seems from L. Calif. 



Geo. A. Purdie, Boston. 

 I obtained the seed from John Rock. 



Geo. Such. 



The variety to which you refer must be the Washingtonia with 

 drooping leaves — collected on the islands off Lower California. It 

 has drooping leaves in the style of Latania borbonica and is more 

 graceful in habit and more robust in growth than the fan palm of 

 the Colorado river, of which it is undoubtedly only a variety. 



Fishermen and prospectors collected the seed and I received 

 them from second parties since gone to Mexico. I do not know on 

 which island they grow. John Bock. 



San Jose, July 31. 



It is necessary to add a few notes to these extracts : — 



No palms are indigenous to the Sacramento valley in Calif. 



No palms are found on any island off the west coast of L. C. 

 except on Guadaloupe Island, where only Erythea edulis is found. 



From a careful examination of a leaf and petiole of W. robus- 

 ta received through Mr. Purdie, grown in Florida, I can detect 

 no material difference from the palm in cultivation at S. Diego 

 which is the one found wild in Lower California by Dr. Palmer 

 and other cyllectors since. 



Mr. J. Eock writes me also that he obtained seed of another 

 palm, which from the description must be Eryrea armata — only 

 found wild in the same vicinity as our San Diego palm. This 

 would seem to indicate that the mythical W. robusta is identical 

 with the species described in the Botany of California, pp. 211 & 

 485, by Prof. Watson as W. filifera. He refers, on p. 485, to "im- 

 "mature fruit of what may prove a second species, said to come 

 "from a much larger sized tree and to be found a hundred or more 

 "miles to the east of San Bernardino" which had been secured by 

 Mr. Wright from Indians. 



This may prove the typical W. filifera of the Colorado river. 

 The necessity of more material for comparison is evident. 



It would be well perhaps, in this connection, to place on record 

 the fact on the north side of Guadaloupe Island, the petioles of 

 the leaves of Erythea armata are armed on the margin with small 

 stout spines; but <m the south side of the island they are unarmed 

 as stated by Prof. Watson. 



