10 Transactions . — Miscellaneous . 



No mention being made of it in ancient Persian, Sanscrit, or 

 Chinese writings, De Candolle concludes that it has been 

 brought into cultivation in comparatively recent times, or not 

 before the Christian era.''-' The species found its way into the 

 Malay Islands in the pre-European time, but had not spread 

 into Polynesia when Foster observed the cultivated plants of 

 that region. We can here see that, while the Polynesian 

 people possessed the ancient Malay plant, they had not re- 

 ceived the more modern species ; and as we proceed with this 

 investigation we shall find that this is a rule holding good 

 throughout. 



Banana (Musa sapientum, or Musa j^cc^'o^cUsiaca). — The 

 original habitat of the banana, like most of those plants very 

 long in cultivation, cannot be determined accurately, but the 

 balance of evidence is in favour of the Malay Islands, where 

 alone a wild species is found, from which the cultivated plant 

 may have been derived. The banana, like the breadfruit, 

 having become barren by long cultivation, can only be multi- 

 plied by offsets aiid suckers ; its wide dissemination through 

 Polynesia is therefore another proof of the colonisation of 

 these islands. 



On the mainland of x\sia the banana has been cultivated 

 for more than four thousand years.''' Throughout the greater 

 portion of tropical Africa, where Europeans only lately made 

 their way, it has been found in cultivation, but it had not 

 reached the portion of the Niger Valley explored by Park 

 towards the end of the last century, though he observed it 

 growing near the mouth of the Gambia, where it had been 

 introduced by the Portuguese.! 



Early Spanish writers assert that the Peruvians possessed 

 two varieties of the banana before the European discovery of 

 the New World, and Humboldt, from his own observations, 

 confirmed these assertions ; but it seems quite certain that the 

 species was unknown in the West Indies or along the eastern 

 portion of the mainland at the time of Columbus's discovery. 

 Owing to these latter facts, the accuracy of the Spanish writers 

 has been disputed by many able authorities, amongst them 

 De Candolle, who, after summing up all the evidence pro- 

 curable, concludes as follows: "If, however, later research 

 should prove that the banana existed in some parts of America 

 before the advent of the Europeans, I should be inclined to 

 attribute it to a chance introduction not very ancient, the 

 effect of some unknown communication with the islands of 

 the Pacific, or with the coast of Guinea, rather than to believe 

 in the primitive and simultaneous existence of the species in 



* " Origin of Cultivated Plants." A. De Candolle. 

 t " Travels in Africa." Mungo Park. 



