136 PLANTS, SEEDS, AND CURRENTS 



Islands. On the beaches of the south coast of Trinidad these fruits 

 are amongst the commonest constituents of the drift, and the seeds 

 are often fresh. On the south-eastern beaches of Tobago, where 

 the fruits are common, about a third of them contained sound 

 healthy seeds. Since the tree is very rare on Trinidad and does 

 not grow on Tobago, it is obvious that the fruits so characteristic 

 of their beaches belong to the drift of the Orinoco and the Amazon ; 

 and it is not surprising that in islands nearest to the true home of 

 the tree the drift fruits should sometimes retain their outer coverings, 

 and that the seeds should be often fresh. In the drift of the Turks 

 Islands only about a fifth possess healthy seeds; but in this small 

 group the seeds do not seem to be able to retain their sound appearance 

 for a long time in the drift. However, though usually in scanty 

 numbers, these drift fruits are to be observed on every beach of 

 the Turks Islands, where the foreign drift collects in any quantity, 

 from Grand Turk to Greater Sand Cay, at the extreme ends of the 

 group. 



These fruits float buoyantly for many months. Three fruits 

 from the Tobago beach-drift were placed in sea-water two years 

 after their collection, and all still floated buoyantly seven and a half 

 months later. In two of them the seeds proved to be discoloured 

 and seemingly dead. In the third they appeared to be fairly sound. 

 From the results of this experiment as well as from the indications 

 supplied by the condition of the seeds in the stranded fruits on West 

 Indian beaches as above described, it would seem that although 

 the fruits would be able to withstand the immersion of a year and 

 a half, which would be involved in their transport to the coasts of 

 Europe, the seeds would probably lose their germinative capacity 

 after the first six months. The floating power is to be entirely 

 ascribed to the numerous impervious round empty cavities (3 to 5 

 mm. across) in the substance of the woody case and to the impermeable 

 outer surface of the fruit, when deprived of its skin. Neither the 

 substance of the fruit nor the seeds possess independent buoyancy. 



It is apparent that Morris formed a similar estimate of the unfitness 

 of the seeds for reproducing the plant after a prolonged ocean 

 traverse. Though impressed with the ideal qualities of the fruit, 

 as far as buoyancy is concerned, he remarked that there is "no 

 record that the seeds have germinated after long immersion in salt 

 water, or that the plant has established itself in a new locality outside 

 its present area." As regards the last point it may be observed that 

 it would scarcely be possible to discover such a record in the case 

 of any large West Indian island, not even for Jamaica. We could 

 not expect any proof more valuable than that which is supplied by 

 the very scanty representation of Sacoglottis amazonica on the south- 

 east coast of Trinidad. 



From what has just been said we would expect to find the fruits 

 of Sacoglottis amazonica on European beaches, though not with 

 sound seeds; and reference has already been made to a specimen 

 in the Kew Museum which was picked up in 1887 by Mrs. Hubbard 

 on the Devonshire coast. But from data given by Sloane in his 

 Natural History of Jamaica (II., 186) it is apparent that these fruits 



