422 D. Prain — Some additional Leguminosse. [No. 2, 



This does not appear to the writer to differ specifically from P. calcaratus, though 

 it seems a fairly distinct variety. 



11. Phaseolus radiatus Linn. Sp* PI. 725. 



The writer quite agrees with Mr. Baker in considering that P. Max Roxb. — the 

 Krishna Mung, and P. aureus Eoxb. — the Sona Mung, are only varieties of P. Mungo 

 Roxb. — the Mung itself. But the Mash or TTrd, which is a totally different plant, 

 yielding an entirely distinct crop, hardly deserves to be treated as specifically 

 identical with Mting. The two plants perhaps differ as species of subordinate rank 

 only, and from the monographer's point of view may be sufficiently differentiated if 

 treated as subspecies. But in a Flora no good purpose is served by introducing 

 academic refinements of this kind into the discussion, and it is better to treat the 

 two plants apart from each other, as Ind ; an cultivators and Government officers, from 

 the necessities of the case, are compelled to treat them. 



The unfortunate thing is that the name which Linnaeus gave to Mung, as is 

 shown by his diagnosis and his reference to Dillenius' excellent figure in Hort. Eltham. 

 t. 235, f. 304, does not conserve the vernacular name of the plant. This would not, 

 of course, have mattered very greatly had Linnaeus not at a later date used the word 

 Mungo, as his description of the plant shows, to designate not Mung, but Tikari. 

 Roxburgh endeavoured to set matters right by reversing the names ; — Roxburgh's 

 P. Mungo is Mung ; his P. radiatus is Mash. In Mr. Baker's account of the plants 

 Roxburgh's treatment is followed, for the P. Mungo of the Flora of British India is 

 Mung and is Roxburgh's P. Mungo, but not P. Mungo Linn. ; Mr. Baker's P. Mungo 

 var. radiata is Roxburgh's P. radiatus, but most certainly is not P. radiatus Linn., 

 for it is not the plant figured by Dillenius. 



The variety glabra of the F. B. I. (which is P. glaber Roxb., a plant introduced to 

 the Calcutta garden from Mauritius) is a variety of P. calcaratus. The variety 

 Wightiana is not a form of Mung but of Mash, as its short ascending pods show. And 

 the writer thinks it possible that in P. trinervius of the F. B. I. (an older name for 

 which is P. sublobatus Roxb.) we have the wild form from which perhaps both Mung 

 and Mash have originated. All three, however, deserve, he believes, to be considered 

 equally distinct now. 



The three leading varieties of Mung (P. radiatus Linn.) may be readily distin- 

 guished as follows : — 



1. Var. typica; foliage dark-green, pods spreading, seeds green. P. radiatus 

 Linn. Sp. PI. 725. P. Mungo Roxb. Flor. Ind. iii. 292. P. Mungo also of the majority 

 of Indian plant-lists ; the Mung or Cheyt Mung crop ; certainly not P. Mungo Linn. 



2. Var. aurea ; foliage paler, pods reflexed, seeds yellow. P. aureus Roxb. Flor. 

 Ind. iii. 297. P. Atsuki Sieb. Verh. Batav. Gen. xii. 57. Sona Mung, the most esteemed 

 form of Mung, generally believed by the natives not to be a ' deshi,' or native variety. 



3. Var. grandis ; foliage medium-green, pods longer, spreading, seeds black. 

 P. Max Roxb. Flor. Ind. iii. 295 vix Linn. ; Krishna Mung, the least esteemed form of 

 Mung. This is certainly an introduced form, probably from the Chinese Empire 

 where it is widely grown from Shanghai to Yarkand. In S. China it is called Luton, 

 " green-beans " (A. Henry n. 68) ; in Yarkand Dr. Scully notes that this is what is 

 known as Mash, a name that in India is restricted to P. radiatus Roxb. (P. Mungo 

 Linn.) — the Mdsh-Kulai or Xfrd crop. 



P. Max Linn, is a composite species. Wight and Arnott say that the plant from 

 Hermann's herbarium included here, and on which the species was probably based, 



