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ground is 5 feet 54 inches. The smaller tree measures 
63 feet, with a breadth of foliage of 2/ feet and a girth of 
2 feet 7 inches at 3 feet from the ground. 
The leaves are oblong and wavy smooth, rather 
firm in texture, dull dark green, paler on the back about 
12-16 inches long and 4 inches wide. The flower spikes 
stand erect on the top of the branches and are 2 feet 
long, a quarter of an inch thick, green and bearing many 
flowers which open one by one. They are sessile and 
creamy white, yellower on the back and of a very curi- 
ous structure, the stamens being collected into a curious 
dense mass in the form of a bearded lip. 
The fruit takes upwards of a year to ripen, and by 
no means do all on the spike ripen. Indeed, this would 
be impossible as the weight of the fruit would break the 
inflorescence even if it did not break the bough bearing 
the spikes. 
The biggest uf the trees produced this year a hundred 
and eight fruits, the smaller one, which grows only 
within a few feet of the other, bore only a few fruits. 
The fruits are round and woody and brown in colour, 
about 6 inches through. They weigh about 2 lbs, 7 oz. 
and each contains from 12 to 15 nuts, which weighs 
altogether gl oz., each nut when peeled weighing half 
an ounce. The nuts are beautifully packed in the capsule 
and quite fill it. When it is ripe the fruit falls to the 
ground while in this differing from the allied Sapucaia 
nut ( Lecythis oleracea) also in the Botanic Gardens, in 
which the top forms a lid which becomes detached and 
lets the seeds fall out. On account of this the Brazil-nut 
is cheaper in the markets than the Sapucaia nut, as the 
natives find it quicker to pick up the whole fruit of the 
Brazil-nut than the scattered seeds of the Sapucaia. 
The seeds from the trees in the Botanic Gardens 
have as yet failed to germinate, possibly oui fruit falls 
before it is quite ripe, but they have been highly appre- 
