420 Ridley. — Branching in Palms. 
is destroyed by insects or through some mechanical injury.’ ‘ Two axillary 
buds inserted immediately below would grow into branches.’ This latter 
suggestion is, I think, an extremely doubtful one. Of the hundreds of trees 
I have seen attacked by coco-nut beetles so that the terminal buds were 
destroyed, I have never seen one in which any lateral buds were extruded. 
Furthermore, when a coco-nut commences to branch, its branches usually 
continue to branch again, nor indeed does it show any signs of injury by 
insects or in any other way. In Perseverance Estate in Singapore there 
was formerly a very remarkable coco-nut tree (PI. XXXVI), which branched 
in a somewhat abnormal manner. From a main single stem were emitted 
three branches. The central one, probably the original main bud, branched 
again, and both branches died. The other two grew tall, and each 
branched in a bifurcating manner. One branch died, the other went on 
growing and branched again. Again one branch died and the other con- 
tinued to develop, and this happened alternately, every alternate branch 
dying. In fact, the growth is in this case cymose. 
This tree, I was told, had never fruited, and showed no signs of having 
been attacked by insects or otherwise injured. In all cases of simply 
forked palms I have seen, the forking is caused by the development of 
an axillary bud well below the main terminal bud, which it usually catches 
up in growth some years later, and being then equal in size or nearly so, 
and parallel to it, suggests that the top has at some time branched, either 
by dichotomy of the bud, or by two equal buds starting just below the 
main bud and squeezing it out ; I do not, however, see any evidence for 
either of these theories, and in palms of which I have been able to observe 
the origin and growth of the two branches neither of these things has 
occurred. 
A bulbilliferous coco-nut (PL XXXVII, XXXVIII). For an account, 
photograph, sketches, and bulbil I am indebted to Mr. R. Scott, who found 
the tree at Lumut, in the Dindings. The tree, he says, is reported to be ten 
years old (in 1903), and grows in a Chinaman’s coco-nut plantation at Pundut, 
about five miles from Lumut. It resembles an ordinary coco-nut, except 
that the foliage is thicker, and has never borne fruit. About five years 
previously, when it should have started bearing, it put out deflexed shoots 
instead of flower spathes. These shoots grow for 4 or 5 feet long, the 
leaves being 2 inches through ; when they are as big as this the whole 
shoot seems to get too heavy, and drops off, and fresh ones appear. The 
whole appearance of the shoot is like an ordinary young coco-nut, and the 
centre is formed of a jointed stem about 30 inches long. Bulbils of this 
nature are not rare in other Monocotyledons, and one might compare 
them to those of Globba, but I do not know of a similar case in a palm. 
Morris, in describing the branching of Nannorrhops , considers that the 
shoots are replacing the inflorescences, and alludes to a similar occur- 
