Amomales.] 



MUSACE.E. 



163 



Order XLVIII. MUSACEiE.— Musads. 



Musae, Juss. Gen. (1789).— Musaceae, Agardh Aph. 180. (182S) ; Ach. Rich. Nouv. Elem. ed. 4. 436. 

 (1828) ; Endlicher Prodr. Fl. Nor/. 34. (1833) ; Endl. Gen. Ixx. ; Lestiboudois in Ann. Sc. Nat. 2. 

 ser. 17. 257. ; Meisner, p. 389. 



Diagnosis. — Amomal Endogens vAih more stamens than one. 



Stemless or nearly stemless plants, with leaves sheathing at the ba-se, and forming a 

 kind of spimous stem, often very large, then* limb separated from the taper petiole by 

 a round tumour, and ha\-ing fine parallel veins divei'g- 

 ing regularly from the midrib towards the margin. 

 Flowers spathaceous. Perianth 6-parted, adherent, 

 petaloid, in 2 distmct rows, more or less iiTegular. 

 Stamens 6, inserted upon the middle of the di\dsions, 

 some always becoming abortive ; anthers linear, turned 

 inwards, 2-celled, often having a membranous petaloid 

 crest. Ovary inferior, 3-celled, many-seeded, rarely 

 3-seeded ; ovules anatropal ; style simple ; stigma 

 usually 3-lobed. Fniit either a 3-celled capsule, \\\\h a 

 locuUcidal dehiscence, or succulent and mdehiscent. 

 Seeds sometimes surrounded by hairs, with an integu- 

 ment which is usually crustaceous ; embryo orthotropal, 

 oblong -linear, or mushroom-shaped, with the radicular 

 end touching the hilum, haATng pierced through the 

 mealy albumen. 



The relationship of this Order will be pointed out tmder 

 Gingerworts and Marants, with which the Musads are 

 strictly related. The flower of Musa is well described 

 in the Appendix to the Congo Expedition, 471., in a 

 note ; that of Strehtzia is pentandi-ous and exceedingly 

 irregular, and is admu'ably illusti'ated in Bauer's draw- 

 ings, published some years since by Ker, under the title 

 of Strelitzia Depicta. The hUum of the seed gives rise to a tuft of long hairs in Urania 

 and Strelitzia. For remarks upon the distinctive characters of some of the genera of 

 Musads, see Endl. Prodr. p. 34, and Lestiboudois in the place above quoted. Musads 

 are doubtless the most perfect of the Amomal AUiance, excelUng the others both in the 

 size at which they ari'ive, and the completeness of their parts of fructification. 



Natives of the Cape of Good Hope, the islands of its south-east coast, and generally 

 of the plains of the tropics, beyond which they do not naturally extend, unless in Japan ^ 

 the clunate of wliich seems to be much at variance with that of other countries in the 

 same latitude. 



They are most valuable plants, both for the abundance of nutritive food afforded by 

 then* fruit, called in the tropics Flantams and Bananas, and for the many domestic 

 purposes to which the gigantic leaves of some species are applied. The latter are used 

 for thatching Indian cottages, for a natural cloth from which the traveller may eat liis 

 food, as a material for basket making, and finally they jdeld a most valuable flax (Musa 

 textilis), from which some of the finest muslins of India are prepared. The stems are 

 formed of the united petioles of the leaves, which are remarkable for the vast quantity 

 of spiral vessels they contain : these exist in such numbers as to be capable of being 

 pulled out by handfuls, and are said to be collected in the West Indies and sold as a 

 kind of tinder. — Dec. Org. 38. The number of threads in each convolution of these 

 spiral vessels varies from 7 to 22. — Ibid 37. The young shoots of the Banana are 

 eaten as a delicate vegetable. The root of HeUconia Psittacorum, the fruit of the 

 Bihai, and the seed of Urania speciosa or Ravenala, a magnificent Palm-like plant, 

 called by the French Arbre du Voyagetir, are said to be eatable ; its pulpy aril, of the 



Fig. CXII.— Musa paradisiaca. 

 seed ; 4. the embryo. 



1. A flower; 2. the stamens, style, and stigma; 3. a section of a 



m2 



