﻿102 



S. Kurz — 'Enumeration of Burmese Palms. 



[No. 4, 



states, and I have, therefore, unhesitatingly connected with it A, laxa, a 

 species that differs in no structural points. Caryota soholifera is another 

 example wherein simple-stemmed and soboliferous plants may occasionally be 

 found in the Burmese jungles not a dozen yards from one another. Species 

 based upon such distinctions, if not also accompanied by structural differ- 

 ences, are in my opinion untenable, and grouping palm-species after such a 

 character is simply misleading. 



Again, the armature in Calamus would appear to me to be also subject 

 to variation within certain limits. It certainly is often very different ac- 

 cording to the age of the rattan itself, or accordingly as the sheaths come 

 from the lower or upper parts of the plant. On the other hand, the Calami 

 (including Dcemonorops) offer so many valuable characters in their spathes 

 and spathules, nature of seeds, loroe and flagellse, and, finally, in the scales 

 and stamens, that we may confidently look forward to a sound and natural 

 classification of the rattans so soon as the numerous book-species, often based 

 upon incomplete pieces only, shall have been got rid of. The difference in the 

 scales of the fruits of Calamus in different stages of growth is so far as pos- 

 sible illustrated in the present paper. The indument of the inflorescences 

 and their spathes seems to afford valuable characters, especially to herba- 

 rium-botanists. The colour, however, of the same varies greatly in the same 

 species, as for example in A. gracilis^ in which some individuals have yellow- 

 ish-white and bright scarlet s^adices, while others have them greenish- 

 purple. 



Burmese palms are still very incompletely known, especially the rattans. 

 While the distributional area of the leiocarpous palms is greater than one 

 might have expected, that of the rattans is singularly restricted and limited. 

 Thus I have been unable, in spite of all the pains I have taken, to identify 

 several of my Burmese rattans with any of the 100 species or thereabouts 

 already published. Only the more light-loving species, such as C. Gurula^ 

 fasciculatus, etc., have a wider distribution. 



Burma and the Andamans contribute each a new type of Calamus in 

 (7. tigrinus and C. Andamanicus, which have the scales of "their fruits fur- 

 nished with fringed appendages as long as or longer than the scale itself. 



I have, in the present paper, endeavoured to supplement my descriptions 

 by the addition of figures, for it is irksome to recognise palms from descrip- 

 tions only ; a figure, moreover, allows considerably shortening of the descrip- 

 tion itself. The small size of the Society's Journal has, however, compelled 

 me to introduce only the most important parts of these bulky plants. 



