APPENDIX, No. V. 471 
That the Bananas now cultivated in equinoctial Africa, come originally 
from India, appears to me equally probable, though it may be allowed that 
the Ensete of Bruce * is perhaps a distinct species of this genus, and indige- 
nous only to Africa. 
The Papaw (Carica papaya), from analogous reasoning, may be regarded 
as of American origin ; there being several other decidedly distinct species 
natives of that continent, while no species except the cultivated Papaw, nor * 
any plant nearly related to this singular genus, is known to exist either in Asia 
or Africa. But in the present case, the assistance derived from the argument 
adduced, may perhaps be considered as unnecessary ; for the circumstance of 
there being no Sanscrit name for so remarkable a plant as the Papaw,t is 
nearly decisive of its not being mdigenous to India. And in the Malay 
Islands, the opinion of the inhabitants, according to Rumphius,+ is that it 
was there introduced by the Portuguese. 
The same argument may be extended to Capsicum, of which all the known 
species probably belong to the new continent; for the only important exception 
stated to this genus being wholly of American origin, namely C. frutescens, 
p. 1), has come to the same conclusion respecting the original country of the cultivated 
Banana, and also that its numerous varieties are reducible to one species. In this disser- 
tation he takes a view of the floral envelope of Musa peculiar to himself. The perian- 
thium in this geuus is generally described as consisting of two unequal divisions or lips. 
Of these, one is divided at top into five, or more rarely into three segments, and 
envelopes the other, which is entire, of a different form and more petal-like texture. 
The enveloping division M. Desvaux regards as the calyx, the inner as the corolla. It 
seems very evident to me, however, that the deviation in Musa from the regular form 
of a Monocotyledonous flower, consists in the confluence of the three divisions of the 
outer series of the perianthium, and in the cohesion, more or less intimate, with these of 
the two lateral divisions of the inner series; the third division of this series, analogous 
to the labellum in the Orchidex, being the inner lip of the flower. This view seems to 
be established by the several modifications observable in the different species of Musa 
itself, especially in M. superba of Roxburgh, (Plants of Coromand. 3, tab. 223) and in the 
flower of Musa figured by Plumier, (Nov. gen. t. 34.), but still more by the irregularity 
confined to the inner series in Strelitzia, and by the near approach to regularity, eyen in 
this series, in Ravenala (or Urania), both of which belong to the same natural order. 
* Travels, vol. 5, p. 36. 
+ Fleming in Asiat, Resear. 11. p, 161. + Herb. Amboin. 1. p. 147. 
