ROSCOEA PURPUREA. 
MONANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
SECT. II. SCITAMINER. 
Gey. Cuar.—Filament short ; anther bilobate, incurved, bicalcarate at the base; stigma globular, with a compressed, 
ciliated orifice; corolla ringent. 
Srec. Cuar.—Inflorescence spathaceous ; flowers rising in succession ; spatha concealed within the sheathing of 
the leaves ; calyx tubular, intire. 
Syv.—Roscoea purpurea. Smith, Exot. Bot. v. ii. p. 97. tab. 108. Trans. Lin. Soc. v. xiii. p. 461. Rees? Cyclop. 
Roscoea purpurea. Hooker, Exot. Flora. tab. 144, 
Hatucon Swa of the Nawars. Smith. 
DESCRIPTION. 
Root perennial, consisting of numerous long, fusiform, diverging tubers, terminating in branching fibres ; 
stem herbaceous, erect, 12-15 inches high, invested in the sheaths of the leaves ; leaves lanceolate-acute, 
alternate, intire, waved at the margins, smooth on both sides, 6—8 inches long, pale green; spike terminal, 
containing 4 or 5 flowers, opening in succession, of a pale purple or lilac colour; calyx tubular, membranaceous, 
intire, sheathing a great part of the corolla; corolla tubular, the tube five inches in length, expanding into 
a double limb or margin; outer limb in three sections, irregular; upper section broad-lanceolate, vaulted, erect, 
mucronate, protecting the interior parts; lateral sections nearly equal, linear-lanceolate, declined; inner limb 
bilabiate ; upper lip in two converging, crescent-shaped lobes, closely enfolding the anther and stigma’; lower 
lip very large, broad-ovate, undulate on the margin, expanding and slightly bifid at the apex; filament short, 
subulate, erect, attached to the faux of the corolla; anther two-lobed, attached at the back to the apex of 
the filament, long, incurved, extending at the base into a bifid appendage of two yellow claws or spurs ; style 
very long, slender, tubular, supported at the base by two erect white processes, of about a fourth of an inch in 
length, conforming itself above to the curve of the anther, and projecting a little beyond it; stigma globular, 
slightly pubescent, with a compressed, ciliated orifice; germen oblong, three-celled. 
OBSERVATIONS. 
The first living plant of this species of Roscoea, which we believe was ever introduced into this country, 
was sent by Dr. Wallich, of Calcutta, to the Botanic Garden in Liverpool, where it lowers in 1821. Since 
that time, it has been received into the Botanic Gardens of Edinburgh and Glasgow, in ag ee oA which 
it flowered in August 1824, and has been well figured and published by Dr. Hooker, in his Peo se 
No. 144. The young plants of this species, on their first flowering, are of a weak an sender habit, and 
differ so greatly in their appearance from eens eae cerca a eee ea 
consider them as a different species, but further experience has led us to adhere to the opinion ¢ EO ee 
that they are in fact the same, and that notwithstanding some dissimilarities, they agree also with the figure 
of Sir J. E. Smith, published many years before the living plant was known here, in his Exot. he fab. my 
Dr. Hooker has remarked that “ few inmates of the stove are possessed of greater Se een either 
E or the durability of their inflorescence, than the Roscoea purpurea ; for its blossoms are 
: : beauty : : 
a d though they are produced singly, and each continues in perfection but for 
n 
singularly large and showy; a 
- ” 
t th is a considerable number and a long succession of them. 
yet there 
one day, 
