4 MR. a. KI^G OK THE SOURCE OF THE 



medicinal and other purposes, where such spices are w anted, under 

 the name of Morung Elachi, or Cardamon" Roxburgh therefore 

 (since he mentions no other) appears to have considered the 

 large brown Cardamom of the Calcutta bazaar the produce of a 

 single species, and that species A. aromaticum. In the ' Hortus 

 Suburbanus Calcuttensis ' (published twenty-five years after 

 the first edition of the ' Flora Indica ' appeared), Yoigt quotes 

 Roxburgh's statement that the Morung JElacU of the bazaars is 

 the produce oiAmomum aromaticum ; but he also mentions a second 



<A 



of a bazaar 



Elach 



hills as its home. Roxburgh, in describing A. subulatum, says 

 nothing of its fruit being sold as a Cardamom. He moreover 

 states (and correctly) that it is a native of the Morung Mountains 

 (i. e. of the outer ranges of the Nepal Himalaya), and not of the 

 Khasia hills as Voigt states. Both plants were in cultivation in 

 the Calcutta Botanic Garden in Roxburgh's day ; and there are 

 still in the Garden library MS. drawings of both made under his 

 direction, and named in his handwriting. A. aromaticum seems 

 to have ripened its fruit in the Garden in Roxburgh's time ; for he 

 both describes it in the i Flora Indica ' and figures it in the MS. 

 drawing just alluded to. But Roxburgh appears never to have 

 seen the fruit of A. subulatum ; for he neither describes it in the 

 ' Flora Indica,' nor figures it in his drawing, which was subse- 

 quently published in his Coromandel Plants (t. 277). The plants of 

 A. subulatum which I have grown have ripened fruit abundantly. 

 Hence I am able now to state that the fresh fruit is about the 

 size of a nutmeg, irregularly obcordate, flattened antero-poste- 

 riorly, having 15 to 20 irregularly dentate-undulate wings, which 

 extend from the apex downwards for two thirds of its length • 

 apex depressed and crowned by the persistent 3-cleft perianth- 

 tube, which rather exceeds the ripe fruit in length : irregularly 3- 

 celled, many seeded ; seeds surrounded by a sweetish pulp. 



Roxburgh was very well informed on economic botany, so much 

 so that since he wrote very little has been added to our knowledge 

 of the uses of Indian plants. It is therefore, I think, a fair con- 

 clusion, either that the fruit of Amomum subulatum was not sold in 

 Calcutta as a Cardamom in Roxburgh's time, or that he confounded 

 the fruit of this species with that of A. aromaticum, and regarded 

 them as one. The conclusion to which Mr. Hanbury came, after 

 going into the matter with his accustomed thoroughness Phar- 



