366 
ON VEGETABLE IVORY PALM. 
an article is turned it easily permits of pieces being added 
to it without the blemish being exposed to view ; and where 
a lid is required for a box of vegetable ivory, a separate seed 
is used for the lid. 
Thus we have another, among many instances, of a vege- 
table product so nearly resembling, and exactly resembling 
to the eye, an animal substance (and that of a very distinct 
yet familiar character) as to be frequently passed off for such ; 
and the generic name, Phytelephas, (Ruiz and Pa von,) will 
thus be found to be very appropriate, being derived from 
$vtov, a plant, and e^os, an elephant, for as the elephant is 
the ivory-bearing animal, so the Tagua is the ivory-bearing 
plant. Much, however, as the albumen of the seed of the 
Phytelephas resembles animal ivory at the first glance, its 
internal organization is extremely different, as may be ex- 
pected. That of the seed of Palms, generally, has been ad- 
mirably illustrated with figures and descriptions by Hugo 
Mohl ; but that of the plant under consideration has especi- 
ally occupied the attention of Professor Morren, of Brussels, 
in the second part of the first volume of Dodonaea, ou Recueil 
d' Observations de Botanique, p. 74, from which we give the 
following extract, and we must refer to the plate itself of that 
work (Tab. II.) for the highly magnified appearance of this 
beautiful and curious structure, and to the several figures to 
which reference is frequently made : — 
" The external covering of the ivory-nut (seed) is so hard 
as to be almost stony, yellowish-grey, smooth, and destitute 
of gloss ; it is attached to a second coating, which is brown, 
porous, and dull, and is incorporated with it. Beneath a hollow, 
which separates these two integuments, is a third, brown, 
veined, warted and glossy covering, traversed by numerous 
fibres, under which lies the albumen which forms the vegetable 
ivory. The vegetable ivory is of the purest white, and free 
from veins, dots, or vessels of any kind, presenting a perfect 
uniformity of texture, surpassing the finest animal ivory; and 
its substance is everywhere so hard, that the slightest streaks 
