C ,So ] 
or berry-bearing heath is the molt extraordinary ; as 
of this are found fome plants with male flowers only, 
oth rs with bo h male and female flowers feparately, 
and ltill others with hermaphrodite flowers. 
What Pere Labat mentions in his Voyage a l' Afrique 
Occident ale fhould iikewife be taken noiice of here. 
This author, after having laid down the different me- 
thods of impregnating the female palm-tree by the 
male, f. ys, that this procefs is not abfolutely necef- 
fary for the production of dates ; for being at Marti- 
nico, he there law growing by an old convent near 
the place, where they anchored, a palm-tree bearing 
dates, although the only one of its kind, which 
was thereabouts. Whether it was male or female, 
lie did not pretend to determine, but was ce tain,, 
that there then was none, nor had been one, within 
two leagues of the place where it grew. He doubts 
indeed whether or no this tree bearing fruit did 
not proceed from the jarina foe cundans of the male 
cocoa tree, which is a fpecies of palm, and which 
grew in abundance near tne tree that bore dates: bat he 
obferves, th t the Hones of thefe dates did not vege- 
ta e, and that thofe, who were defirous of propa- 
gating date-trees, were obliged to plant the Barbary 
dates ; as he believed the others had not the germ 
proper to produce the tree. From this account it is 
very obvious, that the palm-tree here mentioned 
was a female, in which though the fruit ripened, it 
was in fuch a Hate of impel fedaon, as not to be able 
to pro agate its fpccie . In this manner we have 
eggs fiunifhed us by hens, even without a cock; 
but thefe eggs produce no chickens. What this 
father fays of the female palm-tree’s bearing fruit 
without 
