PALM

See also:

• BEACH

BEACH  , a winter resort on the east coast of Florida, U.S.A., in Palm Beach county, about 264 M . S. of St Augustine; served by the Florida East Coast railway . It is situated on a peninsula (about 30 in. long and 1 in. wide) separated from the mainland by Lake Worth, an arm of the Atlantic Ocean, and derives its name from the groves of coco-nut palms which fringe the lake . The coco-nut was introduced here by chance, through the wrecking, off the coast, in January 1879, of a coco-nut-laden Spanish vessel . The Gulf Stream is within about 1 in. of the shore, and the climate is mild and equable, the winter temperature normally ranging between 700 and 750 F . On the Atlantic is the Breakers, a large hotel, and facing Lake Worth is the Royal Poinciana, the largest hotel in the southern states . Palm Beach has few permanent residents and is not incorporated . On the mainland just across the lake is the city of West Palm Beach (pop. in 1905, 1280; 1910, 1743), a pleasure resort and the county-seat of Palm Beach county (created in 1909) . PALM-CIVET, or PARADOXURE, the name of the members of the civet-like genus Paradoxurus, represented by several species mainly from south-east Asia . (See CARNIVORA.) Palm-civets are mostly about the size of the domestic cat, or rather larger, chiefly arboreal in habits, with dark uniform, spotted or striped fur . The common Indian palm-civet (P. niger) ranges through-out India, wherever there are trees, frequently taking up its abodes in roof-thatch . Its diet consists of small mammals and reptiles, birds and their eggs, fruit and vegetables .

From four to six

young are brought forth at a litter, and are easily tamed . Other species are the Ceylonese P. aureus, the brown P. jerdoni, the Himalayan P. grayi and the Malayan P . Hennaphroditus . The small-toothed palm-civets, from the Malay Archipelago, Sumatra and Java, have been separated from the typical group to form the genus Arctogale . In Africa the group is represented by two species of Nandinia, which show several primitive characters .