A fruit is represented on Plate III. fig. 5. of the natural size.
Pl. XIII.
W. Fitch lith. Ford & West Imp.
ROOTS OF AN IRIARTEA.
Pl. XIV.
W. Fitch lith. Ford & West Imp.
IRIARTEA VENTRICOSA. Ht. 20 Ft.
PLATE XIV.
Iriartea ventricosa, Martius.
Pashiúba barriguda, Brazil.
This is the most majestic tree of the genus. The stem reaches eighty or a hundred feet in height, and besides being rather thicker in proportion than in the last species, offers a remarkable character in being constantly more or less swollen near the middle or towards the top. The trunk is generally cylindrical to a height of forty or fifty feet, where it swells out to double its former diameter or more for ten or fifteen feet further, when it again diminishes and becomes cylindrical for about twenty feet to the summit. It is only when the trees have reached their full height or nearly so that the swelling commences. In a forest where they abound many may be seen of a large size, but quite cylindrical from top to bottom, while others present every degree of swelling from a just perceptible thickening to a most extraordinary enlargement. The column of air-roots in this species is six or eight feet high, forming a compact conical mass, the separate roots being more slender than in the Iriartea exorhiza.
The leaves are very large, with the leaflets broadly triangular and much cut and waved, forming a very elegant and yet massive head of foliage. The leaf-olumn is very thick, much swollen at the base, and of a deep bluish green colour.
The unopened spathes are lunate in shape and curved downwards, and the spadices are small and simply branched.