Effect of Foreign Pollination on Cycas Rumphii. 
Preliminary Observations. 
BY 
M. J. LE GOG, Ph.D., M.A. (Cantab.), B.Sc. (Lond.), 
Fellow of the Cambridge Philosophical Society. 
Cycas Bumphii is widely distributed in the low-country of 
Ceylon, where it was supposed to be native. It is met with 
frequently in private gardens, it forms an ornament to many 
railway stations, and is not even of •rare occurrence on the 
borders of some jungles. At the present day, however, the 
dispersal of this species of Cycas does not take place by means 
of seeds, but by the separation of adventitious offshoots that 
grow on the aerial part of the stem or from just below the 
surface of the ground. True seeds are to be found nowhere 
in Ceylon, as far as my information goes. 
After travelling to a great extent in the main open tracts 
in the low-country, it appears to me that no ovules of Cycas 
Rumphii reach their full development along the road that 
runs from Galle to Chilaw, or in a wide radius round Colombo. 
On the other hand, I have found an ample supply of large 
ovules in the Botanic Gardens, Peradeniya, occasional crops 
in the Botanic Gardens at Henaratgoda, and have obtained 
also a few from Matara, a small town in the extreme south 
of Ceylon. But while something like a hundred apparently 
mature ovules have been examined, not a single one con- 
tained even the trace of an embryo. These facts suggested an 
interesting problem, the solution of which was first attempted 
at the^end of 1914, and a note on the subject was sent to the 
“Ceylon Antiquary ” in June, 1915 (2). 
The first idea that suggested itself was to look for male 
cones of C. Rumphii and to try experiments on artificial 
pollination. But all search was in vain ; not a single male 
plant could be found. Mr. T. Petch, Government Botanist and 
Mycologist, Peradeniya, whom I then consulted on this point, 
sent me the following historical information ; — “ You know, 
from Trimen’s “Flora,” that W. Ferguson sent male Cycas 
Rumphii to Thwaites in abundance. I have been arranging 
Annals of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Peradeniya, Vol. VI., Part III., June, 1917. 
0(5)17 (26) 
