BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 213 



place. I do likewise conjecture that the bundle of branches of a plant 



which Horus Apollo says the ancient Egyptians produced as the food 

 on which they lived before the discovery of wheat, was not the Papyrus, 

 as he imagines, but this plant, the Unseie, which retired to its native 

 Ethiopia upon a substitute being found better adapted to the climate 

 of Egypt." 



So much for the classical history of the Ensete; to which we may 



. add that Mr. Stackhouse,* in his ' Commentary on Theophrastus/ sus- 



pects that Bruce's Ensete may be the Mnasium of that author, eatable 



like Papyrus and of a sweet taste, which others consider to be the 



Cyperus esculentus (see Spreng. Hist. Eei Herb. i. p. 78). 



As a species, we may observe that Bruce seems to have taken great 

 pains with his figures, and that, as far as foliage is concerned, they ac- 

 curately represent our plant ; and we may observe that, independent 

 of inflorescence, the Ensete has a near affinity with the Musa superha, 

 Eoxb. Corom. F. vol. iii. tab. 223, and Hook. Bot. Mag. tab. 3849, 3850, 

 of the Southern Peninsula of India ; but the arrangement of the flowers 

 on the spadix and the bracteal scales, as well as the seeds, rather than 

 the fruit, are considerably different. The seeds in our own specimens are 

 much larirer, and we do not find more than from one to three in each 



M. suverba there are nu- 



merous seeds, arranged in two rows in each of the three cells. Again, 

 the inflorescence, as represented by Bruce, almost exactly resembles 



^, I's Musa glauca (PI. Corom. iii. tab. 300), a native of 

 Pegu, but the stem and foliage are considerably different, and the latter 

 of a remarkably glaucous hue, as indicated by the specific name ; whereas 

 our plant has bright yellow-green leaves, and the costa purple on the 

 under side. The fruit also very much resembles that of our plant in 

 size and general form, but the seeds are smaller and more numerous. 

 Both these new Musas of Roxburgh are seed-bearing, and the fruit is 

 scarcely pulpy, and not eatable, and they produce no suckers from the 

 root, as is probably the case with the Ensete. 



Mr. Stackhouse's note on the Mnaaium of Theophrastus is as follows :_ 

 " Nullus dubit quin pi. ^gypti a D- Bruce descnpta et delincata sub nom.u. 

 'Ensete' {vide App. p 36) hie referenda sit. Dempta termmatione 9f <^^. , 7'™'"' 

 Mnasi, Ansi, baud absimiles, et nsus plant«B ad v.ctum hnmanum idem I Iheo- 

 plirastu8 de Ilistoria Plantarum, carante Joh StaeWiouse Oxonu, l»/3 vol. i. p. 

 207.)-" To clench the proof," adds ray friend Mr^ Bennett, who sent me the ex- 

 tract from the British Mnsenm, " he (ilr. Stackhonse) gives a reduced copy of 

 Rruce's figure, and places it opposite to Theophrastus s account of Mna^mm at p. 1 74. 



