S 1 4 ANNALS OF THE ROYAL BOTANIC GAEDEN, CALCUTTA. HUEGEHANUS.
PLATE 226-111.—Calamus Rheedei Gñ^. Fig. 10, mature fruit; fig. 11, the same
fruit x 3 ; fig. 12, seed, dorsal view, X l ^ ; fig. 13, seed longitudioally cut through
tbe embryo, X Ig.
101. CATAMXIS HDESELIANUS Mart. Hist. Nat. Palm, iii, 3^58 t. z xii, f. 3 ( d i a g r . );
Walp. Ann. iii, 483 and v, 831; rlook. f. Fl. Brif. Ind. vi, 452;
Becc. in Rec. Bot. Surv. Ind. ii, 207 ;
C. Wujhtii Grifl. Palms Brit, Ind. 102; pi, CCXTI, C;
C. nxelanoleph H. Wendl. in Kerch. Les Palm. 237.
Daemonorops melanokpis Mart. Hist. Nat. Palm, iii, 331, pi. 175, f, xi and
z XII, f. 4; Walp. Ann. iii, 481 and r, 829. (See also Mart. 1. c.,
p. 342, under C. dioicus and pi. 116 f. xi.)
DESCEIPTION.—Scan dent, of moderate size. Sheathed stem 3 cm. in diam. Leafiheaihs
flagelliferous, gibbous above, more or less covered with a greyish-brown scurf,
especially abundant ÍD the younger parti, including the spinas; densely armed with
solitary or approximate and even subseriate flat subulate sublanceolate straight deflexed
or slightly booked spines, which ai-e intermingled with others smaller and very
Blender, also scattered or subseriate; the largest spines are 10-15 mm. long, their base
is broad, swollen above and concave beneath. Ocrea very short, coriaceous, truncate.
Leaf-sheath jlagella compressed in their lower portion, where armed with straight
slender spines on the edges. Leaves rather large, not cirriferrous; petiole green, even
when dry, about 25 cm. long; rathor stout, almost equally convex on both surfaces,
but more underneath wh^.re armed along the middle with spines similar tn those of
the spathes, but gradually transformed into claws upwards; margins rather acuts and
furnished with unequal spines, solitary or grouped, straight and ascendent or deflexed;
rachis acutely bifaced above from near its base, armed below along the middle with
a single series of solitary claws ; leaflets numerous, equidistant, usually opposite especially
towards the summit, narrowly cmsiform, somewhat attenuate at the base, very
long-acuminatc into a bristly penicillate tip, subshining on both surfaces, slightly
paler beneath, where quite naked or witli a few long bristles scattered along the
niid-costa, distinctly 3-caririate above, where the mid-costa is very acute and much
more pvomiuent than the side-nerves; these usually more than the central one
sprinkled with long or short bristles or more rarely naked; margins acute, very
distinctly ciliolate-spinulous; trai-sverse veinlets indistinct; tl;e largest Itjaflets, up to
70 cm. long but usually 40-50 cm. and 2-5-3 cm. wide; the upper ones smaller;
the two of the terminal pair less acuminate than the others, 12-15 cm. long, quite
free at the base. Male spadix Female spadiz very elongate, teiminating
in a very strong and excessively long flagellum (3 m., 'irigith) which is powerfully
armed with strong broad-based solitary or variously confluent half-whorled or sometimes
nearly completely whorled claws: the axis of the spadix straight, rigid, robust,
bearing a few very distant partial inflorescences; lower primary spathes somewhat
compressed and two-keeled, more or less armed with straight, short, solitary, more or
less horizontal, broad-based spines; upper primary spathes very elongate, some of them
C. Huege/ianus.'] BECCARI. MONOGRAPH OP THE GENUS CALAMUS. .315
up to 40 cm. long, coriaceous, almost polished, tubular, closely sheathing, subcylindraceous
or obsoletely angular-compresscd, obliquely truncate and entire at the mouth,
slightly prolonged at one side into a short acute point, this keeled on the back,
attenuated for a considerable length at the base, more or less densely prickly
on the outer side lower down, and like the lower ones all round in their upper
part; partial inflorescences erpct, rigid, rather densely panicled-pyramidate, the largest
2 0 - 3 0 cm. long with 5-7 gradually diminishing spikelets on racli side, their
axis rigid, slightly zig-zag sinuous ; secondary spathes shortly tubular-infundibuliform,
obliquely truncate, entire and ciliolate at the mouth, more or loss prolonged
at one side into a triangular acute or acuminate point ; spikelets rigid, arched,
spreading or subhorizontal, distichous, inserted just at the mouth of their respective
epathes with a distinct axillary callus and transversal rima, the lowest, the largest
5 - 7 cm. long, with 6—8 slightly secund flowers on each side, or with the two
series of flowers pointing upwards and not spreading in one plane; uppermost
spikelets very few-flowored; spathels shortly infundibuliform, horizontally truncate,
acute at one side; involucrophorum more or less distinctly pcdicelliform, especially in
the lower part of the spikelet, exsert from its own spathel and attached laterally at the
base of the one above with a distinct axillary callus next to the axis, expanded at
the summit into a shallow truncate entire subcalycnliform limb ; involucre slightly
concave, orbicular, subdiscoid-pateriform, with entire or unequal margin ; areola of the
neuter flower callous with a central punctiform scar and sometimes subpedicelliform.
Female flowers rather large, 6 mm, long, ovoid-acute when in bud; the calyx coriaceous,
campanulate, smooth or faintly veined outside, shortly and acutely ^-toothed •
the corolla almost twice as long as th« calyx, its segments thick, ovate or ovatelanceolate,
acute, polished outside ; stamens united by their bases, triangular in the free
portion, Fruiting perianth rather thick, shortly pedicelliform. Fruit almost sphaeric
or slightly turbinate, 15-18 mm. in diam., very suddenly contracted into a short conic
beak and crowned by the persistent reflexed stigmas; scales in 21 series, shining;
quite black or sometimes of a chestnut-brown colour or more rarely spadiceous near
thoir base with a much darker tip and margins, not or very indistinctly channelled
along the middle, longer than broad with a rather elongate triangular not very
adpressed or subsquarrose point; this and the margins distinctly erosely toothed.
Seed globular, 11-13 mm. in diam., covered with the very adherent opaque granulate
integument ; albumen deeply and subradiately ruminate, chalazal fovea indistinct,
embryo basal.
HABiiiT.—Lower India. The type-specimens were collected in December 1850 by
Wight {No. 2760) at Sisparah (Herb. Kew and St. Petersb.) in the Nilghiri mountains,
where it seems a rather common plant, having been found again by Gamble
on the Sisparah Ghat (1,200 m.), at Conoor (1,600-1,800 m.) and at Naduvatam
(1,800 m,).—Hugel's specimen in Martius's Herbarium at Brussels has no special
locality on the label.
OBSERVATIONS.—Thiii species has received three names according to the degree of
development of the flowers or fruit. Martius gave the name of 0. Uuegelianus to the
female plant in flower, and that of Doemonorops mdanolepis to that with immature
ftuit, and Griffith that of C. Wightii to that with full grown fruit. Moreover it
ANN. EOT. BOT. GAKD. CALCUTTA VOL. X I .