1686 CXLII. PALM^. [Calamus^ 



longitudinal ribs 5, beset with fine dark setse ; margins with minue distant teeth. 

 Bhachis and petiole armed with recurved prickles ; those of the sheath long^ 

 flafctish, of irregular length, dense or in more or less fal^e wheels. 



Hab,: Barron Biver, E. Cowley; Atherton and Tully Eiver, Eoth. 



Butls of the young plants roasted, skinned and thenhammered before eaten. —Both. 



3. C. Jaboolum (aboriginal name), Bail. Bot. Bull. xiii. " Jaboolum,"" 

 Barron Eiver, 2?. Cowley. Stems reclining^ but ultimately climbing to a great- 

 height. Leaves about 4ft., including the petiole, which is usually under Gin. 

 long, flattish, bearing upon the margins and upper surface long thin needle-like- 

 prickles of a somewhat blackish hue, often glossy and attaining a length of Sin. ;.: 

 segments often nearly opposite, of about 25 pairs, 12 to 15in. long and IJin.- 

 biroad, narrow-lanceolate, longitudinal ribs often numerous, as many as 12 and) 

 very rarely bearing here and there an odd prickle, the margins armed with- 

 numerous sharp approximate prickles ; sheaths densely covered with dark-brown, 

 or black needle-like prickles 1 or more in. long. Bhachis bearing stout recurvedi 

 prickles. 



Hab.: Barron Eiver, E. CotvUy. 



4. C. IMEuelleri (after Baron Mueller), We7idl. mid Drude. in Linnaa, xxxix.. 

 198 ; Bentli. FL Austr. vii. 135. Small Lawyer-cane. Stem covered with« 

 closely appressed or adnate leaf-sheaths very densely armed with straight slender- 

 prickles or bristles. Leaves from under 1ft. to l^ft. long, with 10 to 16 segments^ 

 the longest Sin. long and fin. broad, all shortly aeuminte, the margins scabrous- 

 with a few minute hooked prickles, and the under surface occasionally sprinkled 

 with a few slender straight prickles or bristles, the rhachis armed with scattered 

 hooked or reflexed prickles. Main rhachis of the inflorescence often very long- 

 slender and armed with recurved prickles, bearing a few distant simple panicles- 

 of 2 or Sin. each with 3 or 4 to 10 or 12 branches or spikes and almost or quite 

 unarmed. Lora slender, 1 to 2ft. long, with numerous hoDked prickles. Outer 

 perianth-segments in the males 1 line, inner segments 2 lines long. Stamens 

 inserted on a thick disk. Staminodia in the females of the shape of the perfect 

 stamens, the filaments shortly united in a ring, the anthers without pollen^ 

 Fruit globular, 5 to 6 lines diameter. 



Hab.: Very common in southern coastal scrubs. 



5. C. caryotoides (Caryota-like), Mlatt. Hist. Kat. Palm. iii. SS8 ; Beiitlu 

 Ft. Austr. vii. 185. Ground Palm. Branches and adnate sheaths armed with: 

 straight prickles and bristles like those of C. Muelleri, but much shorter. Leaves 

 the same length and similarly armed, but the segments mostly broader, some as 

 much as 2in. broad, truncate and toothed or jagged at the end, the edges scabrous 

 with minute prickles as in C. Muelleri. Inflorescence long and loose, but the, 

 partial panicles not distant as in that species. Fruits about 4 lines diameter. 



Hab.: Common in the northern sbrubs. 



14. BORASSUS, Linn. 

 (Said to be from the name given to the fruit of a palm by Dioseorides.) 

 Dioecious, the spadices very large, simply branched ; peduncle sheathed with 

 open spathes ; males with stout cylindric branches that are densely clothed with, 

 closely imbricating bracts, enclosing spikelets of flowers which hence appear as if 

 sunk in cavities of the branch ; female spadix sparingly branched, bearing few 

 scattered solitary flowers. Male flowers small, mixed with scaly bracts, secund 

 in 2 series in a small spikelet, and protruding one by one from the cavities of the- 

 braneli of the spadix as the rhachis of the spike elongates ; perianth glumaceous ;. 

 sepals 3, narrowly euneate, tip inflexed truncate, imbricate ; petals shorter than 



