ZINGIBER SQUARROSUM. 
MONANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
SECT. II. SCITAMINE®. 
Gen. Cuar.—Anther double ;_ filament extending beyond the anther in a subulate beak, embracing the style. 
Srxc. Cuar.—Spike radical, lateral, scarcely rising above the earth; bractes imbricate, lanceolate, villose, crimson 
at the apex; outer limb of corolla in three sections, linear, crenate, reflexed, white ; lip simple, 
ovate, crenate, white. 
Syv.—Zingiber squarrosum. Rowb. in Trans. Asiat. Soc. xi. 348. Flor. Ind. i. 52. 
Zingiber squarrosum. Roemer & Schultes, i. 566. 
Zingiber squarrosum. Sprengel, i. 12. 
DESCRIPTION. 
Roots tuberous, with imbricated squarrose sheaths; stem herbaceous, smooth, erect, 4-5 feet high; leaves 
alternate, lanceolate, distantly nerved, undulate on the margin, smooth on the upper surface and slightly 
villous beneath; petioles from one inch to an inch and a half long, with a very long, smooth, stipule, or 
ocrea, embracing the stem; spike rising from the root at a distance from the stem, ovate, more than half 
immersed in the earth; bractes lanceolate, villose, crimson at the apex, 3—4 flowered, imbricate ; inner bractes 
as long as the tube of the corolla, three-cleft, and crimson at the apex; calyx superior, cylindrical, embracing 
the tube; corolla tubular, with a double limb; outer limb in three sections; sections long, linear, crenate 
at the margins, recurved in various directions, white; inner limb or lip with a short claw, broad, ovate, 
crenate, white, erect; filament extending beyond the anther in a slender subulate grooved beak; anther 
double, linear, grooved, embracing the style; stigma a ciliated cup, projecting beyond the beak; capsule on 
a short pedicel, large, ovate, striate, externally of a fine peach colour, internally a bright scarlet, opening 
from the apex in three valves ; seeds numerous, globular, black, rugose, with a white tomentose aril, arranged 
in two rows, and attached by an upright dissepiment to the middle of each valve. 
OBSERVATIONS. 
Although we have received this plant at three several times from our different correspondents in India, 
under the name of Zingiher squarrosum, we are by no means certain that it is the plant described under the 
same name by Dr. Roxburgh in the Flor. Ind. the corolla being there described as having an exterior border 
of three pink-coloured, lanceolate-acute segments, and the inner border or lip as two-lobed at the base, the 
apex bifid, and the colour a speckled mixture of purple, red, and yellow; whilst in our plant, which has 
flowered with us for several successive years, these parts differ both in form and colour, the corolla being 
intirely white. Other differences, of no less importance, seem to exist between the plants described ; insomuch 
that we shall not be surprised if the specific name Squarrosum should belong to a different species, and the 
present one should appear not to have been heretofore described. We are, however, fully convinced, that 
our friends who at present preside, with such acknowledged ability, over the Botanical departments at Serampore 
and Calcutta, will, on the inspection of our work, be enabled to remove our doubts. 
