52 monandria monogynia. Zingiber. 



garden the rainy season ; the seeds ripen in November and 

 December. 



Root jointed, running horizontally at some depth under the 

 surface of the earth, and furnished with long fleshy fibres from 

 the joints; from these joints shoots rise, and by them the 

 plant is readily propagated. Stems about two feet high, 

 bending considerably to one side. Leaves alternate, approxi- 

 mate, bifarious, sessile on their sheaths, from cordate below 

 to lanceolate toward the top of the plant, both sides smooth, 

 and marked with paralleled veins, the under side paler green, 

 length from three to twelve inches, and breadth about four. 

 Sheaths smooth, from the mouth of each rises a remarkably 

 large long strap, or ligula, which by the growth of the plant 

 becomes bifid, and by age scariose. Spikes radical, half 

 hid in the earth, oblong, loosely imbricated with cuneiform, 

 pink-coloured, one -flowered, exterior scales or bractes; and 

 the same number of inner colourless, tridentate shorter 

 bractes ; or, as they may be called, inferior perianths. Calyx 

 superior, one-leaved, spathiform, about half the length of 

 the tube of the corol, irregularly tridentate. Corol ; tube 

 slender, the length of the exterior scales of the spike, incurv- 

 ed. Exterior border of three, nearly equal, linear, acute, 

 smooth, reddish divisions. Lip oblong, obtuse ; margins much 

 curled, with two expanding, more or less acute lobes at the 

 very base ; colour a palely ellow. Filament short ; below the 

 two lobed anther, linear, ending above in the usual long, ta- 

 per, curved, grooved beak. Germ oval, villous, three-celled, 

 each containing many ovula attached to a central receptacle. 

 Style very slender, and so long as to elevate the funnel-shap- 

 ed, ciliate stigma to an equal height with the apex of the fi- 

 lament. Nectarial scales long and slender, embracing the 

 base of the style within the bottom of the tube of the corol. 

 Capsule ovate, size of a large olive, three-sided, three-celled, 

 three- valved, opening from the apex down the angles ; inside 

 of the cells crimson. Calyx leathery, striated, pale, dull 

 yellowish straw colour. Seeds many, oval, blackish brown ; 



