334 
The Garden Magazine, February , 1921 
America. The sombre Garcinia spicata with dark leathery 
leaves and erect panicles of small white flowers brought back to 
my memory the Sinkin Islands where first I saw this tree. Banyan 
trees (Ficus indica) of monstrous size and often with a shrine 
beneath, and the Bo tree (Ficus religiosa) sacred to Buddha, are 
common objects in the city and surrounding neighborhood. 
Plantations of the Para Rubber (Hevea brasiliensis) may be seen 
even in the precints of Colombo and the industry — one of the 
romances of modern tropical agriculture — is of very great im- 
portance in Ceylon. The Breadfruit tree, once a feature of the 
environs of Colombo, has been largely felled and the streets 
no longer reek with the pleasant odors of cinnamon bark. A 
curious tree suggesting a gigantic Horsetail is Casuarina equi- 
setifolia with pendent, slender, tassel-like, gray-green branch- 
lets contrasting strangely with the rigid crowns of its broad- 
leaf neighbors. Such Palms as Latanias, Kentias, and Phoen- 
ixes are common in every garden, and here and there I noted the 
lovely Areca lutescens with yellowish stems and feathery 
arching leaves, and the slender stemmed Pinanga Macarthuri 
with short, rather heavy, pinnate leaves. A remarkable Palm is 
Carvota urens, with a stout stem; broad, much-divided pinnate 
leaves, each pinna coarsely notched; and bearing on its naked 
trunk huge clusters of yard-long ropes strung 
with bead-like fruits. 
B UT the glory of Colombo is the Cocoanut 
Palm. It luxuriates everywhere; it 
fringes the surf-wracked strand, the sides of 
the brackish lagoons, and fresh water streams; 
and yonder forms orchards miles in extent. 
It is the most strikingly beautiful tree of the 
Ceylon littoral as indeed it is of the tropics in 
general. Its slightly leaning cylindrical trunk 
is capped full sixty feet aloft with a feathery 
crown of rich green arching leaves in the axils 
of which cluster the familiar fruits in all stages 
of development from the tiny young grass- 
green nutlet to the large egg-like golden ripe 
fruit. Every part of this tree has its uses. 
The stems are used as uprights in rough 
construction work; and the wood is often 
made into chairs and other useful articles; 
the leaves are employed in roofing native 
huts and to make hoods "Mr native carts; 
from the husk of the fruit the well-known 
coir-fiber is obtained; the sap within the nut 
serves as a refreshing beverage and when fer- 
mented yields a potent spirit; the hard shell of 
the nut is made into drinking cups and may 
yet be useful in button manufacture; the white 
flesh when fresh is a valuable article of food, 
and when split and dried forms the copra of 
commerce so much used in soap-making and 
in other industries. No other tree has so many 
valuable uses and no tree is more abundant on 
tropical shores than the lovely Cocoanut Palm 
— Queen of the Coral Strand. 
Off Frementle, West Australia. 
Oct. 15th, 1920 
THE YELLOW FLOWERED 
ALLAMANDA 
Familiar in the “stove house” of 
northern regions it is the most 
showy trailing greenhouse vine of 
its color and produces its flowers 
freely 
THE FRAGRANT STEPHANOT1S 
Its most deliciously scented, waxy-white 
flowers are well known in our greenhouses- 
where it is usually grown as a trailing vine 
close under the ridge. This and the Alla- 
manda are common decorative vines in 
tropical regions 
