EFFECT OF LIGHTNING ON COCONUT PALMS. 
35 
based on general opinions, not on detailed and continuous 
observation. It would appear, therefore, that there is still 
need of careful records of the effects of lightning in the 
tropics. 
The records of the Registrar-General of Ceylon give the 
average number of deaths by lightning in this country as ten 
per annum from 1891 to 1898, and eleven per annum from 
1898 to 1910. The actual numbers for each year from 1899 
are given in the following table : — 
1899 .. 
. . 16 
1906 .. 
7 
1900 .. 
. . 18 
1907 .. 
. . 15 
1901 .. 
. . 17 
1908 .. 
. . 15 
1902 .. 
. . 13 
1909 .. 
. . 11 
1903 .. 
2 
1910 .. 
. . 10 
1904 .. 
9 
1911 .. 
2 
1905 .. 
4 
The population of Ceylon in the year 1911 was 4,106,350. 
That coconut palms are killed by lightning is well known to 
all coconut planters. The editor of the ‘‘ Tropical Agri- 
culturist ” wrote in 1886 (Vol. VI., page 73) : ‘‘ Those 
connected with coconut estates are aware that, besides the 
destruction of young trees by the grubs or beetles, they must 
lay to their account a varying but appreciable percentage of 
loss of trees at all stages of growth from the effects of light- 
ning ; ” and the well-known Ceylon coconut planter, Mr. W. H. 
Wright, stated in “ All about Coconut Planting ” (3rd edition, 
1914, Appendix, page iv) : ‘‘ The ills a coconut property is 
heir to are drought, white ants, beetles, and lightning.” The 
statement of Sir Emerson Tennent, referred to by Seeman 
{loc. cit.), is : “ One pre-eminent use of the coconut palm is 
omitted in all these popular enumerations, it acts as a con- 
ductor in protecting their houses from lightning. As many as 
500 of these trees were struck in a single pattu near Puttalam 
during a succession of thunderstorms in 1859.” 
But though the destruction of coconut palms by lightning 
is an undoubted fact, it is necessary to exercise considerable 
caution in accepting that as an explanation of the death of 
trees in any particular case. As a general rule, the native 
always assigns the death of a coconut palm to lightning, or, 
in the rare event of the absence of thunderstorms for any 
