Chap. X.—B. S.] 
THE MAMA-EN-KHANENT. 
157 
presence of water inside the fruit would not settle the 
question whether we have the real Cocoa-nut before 
us. What is popularly termed the u water ” is com¬ 
mon to all Palms when the fruit is sufficiently young, 
and disappears on approaching maturity. The water 
—to keep to the term—would probably not be noticed 
in small fruit; and the fact that it was specially 
alluded to in the apostrophe would seem to imply that 
the author was speaking of a large fruit. The height 
of the tree mentioned in the papyrus (sixty cubits) 
tallies well with that usually attained by the Cocoa- 
nut tree in the tropics and near the sea ; but it may be 
questioned whether that Palm would attain its full 
dimensions in a place situated like Thebes. I have 
seen the tree struggling for existence at the very 
edge of the equinoctial region, even in its favourite 
haunts in the neighbourhood of the sea—for instance, 
the Sandwich Islands and the Gulf of California. 
There are no other points a botanist could lay hold 
of, in the materials come to hand, and I may there¬ 
fore be permitted to guess what other Palm can 
possibly be meant by the Mama-en-lclianent. The 
Palms of Egypt are the Date and the Doum ( Phoenix 
dactylifera and Hyphcena Thebaica ), both of which are 
disposed of by the writer in the ‘ Parthenon.’ But 
there is a Palm in Nubia, and probably also in 
Upper Egypt, the Deleb ( Borassus JEthiopum , Mart.), 
which has a fruit quite as large as some of the 
middle-sized kind of Cocoa-nut, and the ventricose 
trunk of which has evidently been the prototype of 
the columns seen in Egyptian temples ; the Date-palm, 
