154 MR. D. HANBURY ON AMOMUM ANGUSTIFOLIUM. 
Note on Amomum angustifolium, Sonnerat. 
By Dawizr Hanzury, Esq., F.R. € L.S. 
[Read December 7, 1871.] 
Tue fruits which I now lay before the Society are those of 
Amomum angustifolium, Sonnerat, ripened in my hothouse at 
Clapham during the past autumn. 
This species of Amomum was collected by Sonnerat in Mada- 
gascar, and described and figured in his ‘Voyage aux Indes 
Orientales et à la Chine, published in 1782. It was cultivated in 
the Calcutta Botanical Garden by Roxburgh, who states that 
plants of it were brought thither from Mauritius in 1802. An 
excellent coloured drawing is in the Roxburgh Collection now 
at Kew. 
Bojer, in his * Hortus Mauritianus, published in 1837, men- 
tions, as occurring in Mauritius, a plant which he calls Amomum 
nemorosum or Longouze. That this is the same species as the 4. 
angustifolium of Sonnerat, I have ascertained by means of a good 
suite of specimens and coloured drawings transmitted to me 
several years ago by M. Emile Fleurot, of that island. Bouton, 
in his ‘Medicinal Plants of Mauritius’ (1857), assigns to the 
Longouze its correct name of Amomum angustifolium, Sonnerat. 
He asserts that it was brought originally from Madagascar ; but 
in a letter to me under date May 6, 1861, he remarks that 
“is positively a native of Mauritius, where it grows abundantly 
in marshy places.” 
My plant was raised from seeds sent from Mauritius to the 
Paris Exhibition of 1867. When it flowered, in June last, Į was 
instantly struck with its perfect resemblance to the West ee 
A. Danielli, Hook. f.; and a careful comparison convinced of 
the identity of the two species. 
Of the West-African plant I have specimens from Sierra 
Leone, Monrovia, Grand Bassa, Cape Palmas, Akassa, Old v 
labar, the islands of Fernando Po and St. Thomas, and the rive? 
Gaboon. It varies in the colour of the flower, which is some- 
times of a uniform chrome-yellow, sometimes crimson, with the 
labellum of a yellow more or less pale, and sometimes, agaw, 
entirely crimson ; but the shape of the flower, which is highly 
characteristic, presents but little variation. The scape is either 
short or long (that is, from 3 to 8 inches, or more), and varies 
greatly in the number of fruits which it bears. The fruits are 
