MONOCOTYLEDONS WITH PETALOID FLOWERS. 
Natural Order 
PALMACEiR Tab. 88. 
Diagnosis. —Usually trees with unbranched trunks bearing a terminal 
crown of large pinnate or palmate leaves. Flowers small, often very 
numerous, upon a spadix; perfect or unisexual, with a 6-leaved perianth. 
Ovary superior of three free or coherent carpels; ovules usually solitary in 
each cell. 
Distribution. —A large and majestic group, almost peculiar to Tropical and Subtropical countries 
of both Hemispheres. A few species penetrate northwards in Eastern Asia as far as Japan, in North 
America to the United States, and a solitary species reaches Southern Europe. In the Southern 
Hemisphere a few members of the Order occur in Extra-tropical America and in Australia. 
Trunk usually erect, occasionally wanting; prostrate on the ground as in Vegetable Ivory Palm ( Pliytelcphas ), 
or climbing and rope-like, often 1,000 ft. or more in length, as in Rattan Palms {Calamus). 
Leaves pinnate as in Date {Phoenix) and Cocoa-Nut {Cocos), fan-like (palmate) as in Palmyra ( Borassus) and 
the European Fan-Palm {Chamcerops) ; leaflets wedge-shaped in Wine Palm {Caryota.) 
Fruit extremely variable in respect of the pericarp : apocarpous, one carpel only usually maturing, with a 
succulent pericarp in Date ; or syncarpous, with 2 cells of the ovary suppressed : a thick fibrous outer pericarp (the 
husk) and bony endocarp (the shell) in Cocoa-nut. 
Seed with abundant albumen ; fleshy in Cocoa-Nut, horny in Date, or hard and bony in Vegetable Ivory. 
USES, &c.—Palmace^e furnish in tropical countries besides daily food, habitation, clothing, and domestic 
utensils to a large proportion of the inhabitants. A few of the important economic species are :— 
