278 Mr.Roscor’s Remarks on Dr. Roxburgh’s Description 
from,doubt. He has indeed referred to your authority (Trans. 
Linn. Soc.i. 249,) and has quoted the figure in Rheede, Hort. 
Mal. xi. 8.; but on referring to your Paper, I find this figure 
. cited by you with a query; and subsequent discoveries have 
shown that your doubt was well founded. Why was not the re- 
ference made to the C. Arabicus of Jacquin, (Pl. Rar. tab. i.) 
* whose magnificent figures and full description," as you justly 
observe, ** render all further observations unnecessary ?" The 
figure of Van Rheede is very different, and is probably the true 
Costus Arabicus; it appearing, on the authority of Sir Joseph 
Banks, communicated to Dr. Roxburgh, that the root of the 
Speciosus does not at all resemble the Costus Arabicus of the shops. 
Of eight species of Alpinia described by Dr. Roxburgh, six are 
already known, both by descriptions and figures. Of the other 
two, we are informed that A. mutica is an elegant species, and 
holds a middle rank between nutans and calcarata, and that spi- 
cata is the smallest of the species that Dr. Roxburgh had seen. 
Among the above six plants already known, is the Amomum 
repens of Sonnerat, figured in Hort. Mal. xi. tab. A and 5; which 
Dr. Roxburgh has now included in Alpinia, under the name of 
A. cardamomum. Vor this arrangement, I am far from presuming 
that plausible reasons may not be given, although Dr. Roxburgh 
has not stated them. The fact is, that this plant has been at- 
tended with greater difficulty in deciding on its genus than any 
other in the whole order. In my Paper on Scitaminee, in the 
Linn. Trans., where this plant is given on the authority of Son- 
nerat and Willdenow, under the name of Amomum repens, I have 
recorded in a note the opinion with which you favoured me; that 
* this plant, which affords the common lesser Cardamum of the 
shops, is really an Alpinia.” It must, however, be allowed, that 
between this and the other plants included in that genus, there 
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