374 BOTANY. 



merous clusters of flowers, and subsequently, a 

 great weight of fruit. The flowers are pale-yellow, 

 and arranged on short pedicles in a palmated form, 

 each cluster being partly concealed within a purple- 

 red spathe ; the corolla is composed of two petals, the 

 one erect and toothed, the other short, and bearing a 

 nectary in the shape of a membranous scale, which 

 contains a sweet and gelatinous nectar. Of the six 

 stamens, one is usually rudimental, and often deficient. 

 The fruit succeeds to the flowers very gradually : it is 

 usual to notice large fruit on the base of the spike, 

 while the spathes and flowers on the apex are as yet 

 unexpanded. The ripe fruit is six inches long by three 

 or four in circumference, is slightly curved, and its 

 sides present three angles ; its rind is smooth, tough, 

 of a pale-yellow colour, and has an astringent quality 

 which blackens steel ; the pulp within is soft and yellow, 

 has a sweet farinaceous taste, not unlike that of a 

 mellow pear, and is an exceedingly wholesome and 

 nutritious food. The centre of the pulp exhibits rudi- 

 ments of three vertical divisions, or valves, each con- 

 taining several small black bodies or abortive seeds. 

 A single bunch of the ripe fruit will weigh from thirty 

 to forty pounds. 



I found at Raiatea, Society Isles, a species or variety 

 of this fruit which was new to me : it was longer, and 

 more slender and curved than the common banana, 

 and, when perfectly ripe, its rind retained a grass-green 

 colour, while the pulp within was yellow, crisp, and of 

 admirable flavour. This fruit is so rare and good, that 

 the natives do not often sell it to foreign shipping. 



Society and Sandwich Isles ; native name meia. 

 Marquesas, meika. Timor. St. Helena. 



