X, C, 5 
Merrill: Philippine Plants, XII 
311 
constituents of the Samoan and Philippine flora is so very striking that 
Vaupel’s entire collection might almost as well have been made at some 
point in the Philippines; the percentage of difference as to species is no 
greater between Vaupel’s Samoan collection and the general run of the 
Philippine flora than is noted in current collections made in botanically 
unexplored parts of the Philippines as compared with the known flora of 
the Archipelago. 
K. Schumann and Lauterbach note that oil produced by the fruits is 
used in the Solomon Islands for caulking the seams of boats; in the 
Philippines it is used by the natives of Agusan Valley, Mindanao, for 
water-proofing bamboo and rattan baskets. The following note was sup- 
plied by Dr. M. L. Miller, of the division of ethnology, Bureau of 
Science, and communicated by him with botanical specimens: “The fruit 
of the tabon-tabon tree, when mature, is full of a yellowish-white pulp, 
that has about the hardness of a camote (sweet potato). On being rubbed 
over a rough surface, such as a rattan plaiting, it fills the interstices, 
assuming a chocolate color and drying within an hour to a hardness that 
does not crack under a torrid sun. The coating of tabon-tabon on baskets, 
etc., is frequently darkened in color with charcoal.” 
Native names: tambon-tambon (Masbate) ; batobon (Palawan); tabun- 
tabun (Albay) ; tabon-tabon (Surigao, Agusan). 
As to nomenclature, the oldest valid specific name applied to the Philip- 
pine form is Parinarium mindanaense Perk., the type of which I have 
examined in the Berlin herbarium. Parinarium racemosum Merr., published 
a few months later, and during the same year, is invalidated by P. race- 
mosum Vid. (1880); P. curranii Merr. was proposed as a new name for 
P. racemosum Merr., non Vidal. 
PYGEUM Gaertner 
PYGEUM EUPHLEBIUM sp. nov. 
Arbor 10 m alta, subtus foliis ad costa ramulis inflorescen- 
tiisque ferrugineo-villosis ; foliis oblongis, coriaceis, usque ad 
10 cm longis, integris, acuminatis, basi subacutis ad rotundatis, 
nervis utrinque 8 ad 10, supra impressis, subtus valde prominen- 
tibus, reticulis laxis, obscuris; racemis spiciformibus, brevibus, 
fasciculatis, 1 ad 1.5 cm longis, bracteolis deciduis, fructibus 
junioribus anguste ovoideis, plus minusve ferrugineo-villosis. 
A tree about 10 m high, the young branches, inflorescence, 
petioles, and the leaves along the midrib on the lower surface 
rather prominently ferruginous-villous. Branches slender, te- 
rete, dark brownish-purple, glabrous. Leaves oblong, coria- 
ceous, 7 to 10 cm long, 2 to 4 cm wide, the upper surface shining, 
brownish-olivaceous, the lower paler, brownish, the apex shortly 
and sharply acuminate, the base subacute to rounded, with one 
or two plane, dark-colored, small glands evident on the lower 
surface near the base; lateral nerves impressed on the upper 
surface, very prominent on the lower surface, 8 to 10 on each 
