254 MB. C. B. CLABKE ON 



was in full flower at 4100 feet, with leaves 5 feet long and more 

 (the lamina 32 by 11 inches), the flower-spikes very large, white, 

 the rhizome gamboge-yellow when cut across. It is a very 

 striking plant ; but, comparing it with the medium-sized common 

 white Amomum of the 1500-feet level, I could find no specific 

 difference. The BZedychium common here is now (October) very 

 shabby, but is throwing up young stems to flower next April. 

 These are very red, with the young leaves red and scale-like, and 

 so exceedingly like the flowering (leafless) stems of the Zingiber 

 that (the two plants growing mixed) it is difficult, without taking 

 the plant in the hand, to say whether you have got a young stem 

 of HedycMum or a leafless flower-stem of Ginger. Is the leafless 

 flower-stem of Ginger really only an ordinary stem gradually 

 forced abnormally early into flower by a secular change in 

 climate ? There was a fine Elettaria in fruit, which is nearly or 

 quite the same as the one that grows at Khursiong in Sikkim. I 

 saw three ground Orchises in fruit : I have never seen on Parasnath 

 any epiphytic Orchis ; the air seems too dry, though there is 

 ■Vanda in abundance on the Mohwa trees (Bassia) at the base, as 

 you found it. In spite of the dryness, there are a good many 

 Terns even near the summit. Asplenium {Brepanophyllum is the 

 name) abounds, while the nearly allied common A. (Athyrium) 

 macrocarpum is absent. Parasnath is the north-east limit of 

 the A. (Brepanophyllum) HohenacTcerianum, which is, I believe, 

 abundant in Central India." I also collected several specimens of 

 Ophioglossum vulgatum : I say vulgatum, relying on Luerssen, 

 who has (I doubt not correctly) run a number of Ophioglossums 

 into that species. The Indian Ophioglossums are not less in- 

 teresting considered as forms than considered as species : this 

 Parasnath form is, however, much more like the common English 

 Ophioglossutn than either the Sikkim or Levinge's Xashnior one. 



It is 15 years ago since I first ascended Parasnath, and I see 

 wonderfully little difference in the vegetation : there are the 

 same plants, in the same relative degrees of abundance, and I can 

 hardly pick out one that I can say has either advanced or retreated 

 100 yards, so nicely are the forces balanced. There is the Tha- 

 lictrum, the Geranium, the Barberry, the Senecio, &c, on the 

 ridge exactly where you found them, and, as of old, the giant 

 scandent Bauhinia ascending a few feet higher than any of 

 them. 



