FOREIGN DRIFT OF THE TURKS ISLANDS 129 



Plukenet states that Sloane showed him specimens obtained from 

 Jamaica that retained this outer case. I find it difficult to believe that 

 such fruits did not reach Jamaica from some source nearer than 

 Trinidad and the Orinoco and Amazon regions. I only found the 

 fruits retaining the " cortex " on the north side of the island, and it 

 will be pointed out below that it is just on these northern Jamaican 

 beaches that these drift fruits are most numerous and most likely 

 to be at all fresh. The foreign drift on the north coast of Jamaica 

 must be mainly Cuban and Haitian ; whilst that on the south coast 

 would be largely brought by the Equatorial Current from Trinidad 

 and the adjoining estuary of the Orinoco, as well as from the Amazon 

 estuaries further south. 



On Trinidad, where these palms grow in the swamps, and on the 

 neighbouring island of Tobago, the entire fruits are frequently found 

 in the beach-drift, where they are mingled with others that have 

 lost the outer coverings, and have in some cases come from a great 

 distance, since not a few are incrusted with Balani and similar 

 marine organisms. 



Within the common casing are usually two or three (at times 

 only one) globular fruits of the size of a small apple and covered 

 by a hard thin shell, which is somewhat brittle and more or less 

 adherent to the indurated skin of the kernel. The albumen lines 

 a large cavity, as in the coco-nut, and it is to this cavity that the 

 fruit's buoyancy is entirely due. It is the bared globular fruit that 

 is characteristic of beach-drift over much of the West Indian region. 

 Very rarely does one come upon a fruit that is seemingly " germinable," 

 and then, as a rule, only in the vicinity of its home. In Jamaica, where 

 the fruits are more numerous on the northern than on the southern 

 beaches (probably in the first case largely derived from Cuba or 

 Haiti, and in the last case cast up by the Equatorial Current), it is 

 very difficult to find a fruit that could be characterised as sound, 

 and when one is found it is on the north coast. Around the districts 

 of Black River and Savanna-la-mar, on the south-west coasts, all 

 examined had mouldy or unhealthy kernels with embryos gone or 

 in a decaying state. On the north coast, as around St. Anne's Bay 

 and its vicinity, I found that about 20 per cent, were rotting inside, 

 and about 60 per cent, displayed sour-smelling, mouldy kernels and 

 decaying embryos. The remainder were fairly healthy, but the 

 embryos were excessively shrunken, and the albumen was usually 

 hard and dry ; but in a few cases the contents were fresh and relatively 

 moist and the embryo was healthy, water still remaining in the 

 seed cavity. 



It is noteworthy in this connection that the fruits collected by 

 Morris amongst the beach-drift off Kingston on the south side of 

 Jamaica were found at Kew to possess unsound seeds (Chall. Bot., 

 IV., 303). This is the rule in Jamaica. On the other hand, in an 

 island like Trinidad, where the palm is at home in the coast swamps, 

 fresh fruits are frequent among the stranded drift, 50 per cent, of 

 those observed by me being sound. However, some of these fresh 

 fruits may be derived from a source near at hand, namely, the 

 estuary of the Orinoco. In Tobago, only twenty miles distant from 



K 



