338 
Notes. 
BRANCHING PALMS. — In the Annals of Botany, vol. xxi, p. 415, I gave an 
account of the branching of palms as far as I had observed variations of this character ; 
since then I have come across three more instances which seem to me to be worthy 
of record. 
Two of these are remarkable instances of branching in the two cultivated species 
of Metroxylon, viz. Metroxylon Sagus , Rottb. and M. Rumphii , Mart. 
The Sago palms, as is well known, are rhizomatous palms possessing a stout 
branching stem which creeps half buried in the damp soil and sends up from its leaf- 
axils huge, lofty, erect branches which are eventually terminated by the flower panicle. 
In clearing a thick patch of scrub in the Singapore Gardens, in which about 
twenty-five years ago a quantity of both kinds of Sago had been planted, the remark- 
able abnormalities, one of M. Sagus and the other of M. Rumphii growing at 
a few feet distant from each other, were found. In both the abnormality was almost 
identical, the only difference being that one had developed a little more than the 
other, so that one description will serve for both. 
From the ordinary rhizome is growing an erect stem, now about two feet round and 
six feet tall ; at this height the stem bears a clump of four shoots, one of which is large 
and grows at an angle with the top of the stem, and the three smaller shoots surround 
it. Below this clump is a mass of roots about a foot and a half long, so that the whole 
has the appearance of a rhizome with the ordinary shoots, placed on the top of a bare 
cylindric stem. This is M. Sagus. The other plant (M. Rumphii ) is very similar 
except that the stem is stouter and the clump at the top is not bent at an angle, 
but stands exactly on the top of the bare stem. The main shoot is larger and there 
are four other side-shoots. The mass of aerial roots, too, is larger. The abnormality 
is probably due to some accident, such as the falling of a tree on the top of the 
two erect stems, and the big shoots probably represent the original stem shoots, 
which have taken on the form of a rhizomatous portion, and thrown up lateral shoots 
and emitted roots after the manner of a rhizome. 
I have never before seen an erect stem of the Sago palms showing any signs of 
branching whatever, or emitting buds, and think that this is worth recording. 
Korthalsia ferox , Becc. A remarkable branched stem of this rattan was brought 
from the Rantau Panjang Reserve in Selangor to the Agricultural Exhibition in 
Kuala Lumpur in 1908. The base of the stem for about six feet from where it is cut 
off is quite normal, but at that height is emitted a lateral shoot incomplete, and about 
eight inches further, a long one three feet in length. This shoot is extruded through the 
sheaf of a leaf, which is split three inches above the mode. It is half an inch thick, 
and at the base, where it is extruded, are three short annular sheaths. The branch 
consists of eight internodes, and produces no other branches. Above the point at 
which this branch is produced the main stem continues, and above the next node is 
emitted another branch two feet long (the complete top is missing). This is similar in 
form and in the basal sheaths to the preceding one, but this branch emits two others. 
The lowest appears above the second internode ; above the next internode appears 
another branch, which again emits another branch thirteen inches long. The branches 
are alternate, not quite regularly arranged, but approximately a quarter of the circle 
apart. The branching of rattans to a certain extent has been mentioned in the paper 
