COMPARATIVE VIEW. 157 



reduction to a single species is even confirmed by the mul- 

 titude of varieties that exist -^ by nearly the whole of these 

 varieties being destitute of seeds ; and by the existence of 

 a plant indigenous to the continent of India, producing 

 perfect seeds ; from which, therefore, all of them may be 

 supposed to have sprung. 



To these objections to the hypothesis of the plurality of 

 species of the Banana, may be added the argument referred 

 to as contributing to establish its Asiatic origin ; for we are 

 already acquainted with at least five distinct species of 

 Musa in equinoctial Asia, while no other species has been 

 found in America ; nor does it appear that the varieties of 

 Banana, cultivated in that continent, may not equally be 

 reduced to Musa sapientum as those of India : and lastly, 

 it is not even asserted that the types of any of those sup- 

 posed species of American Banana, growing without culti- 

 vation, and producing perfect seeds, have any where been 

 found.^ 



That the Bananas now cultivated in equinoctial Africa, [tn 

 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 indigenous 

 only to Africa. 



' Musa sapientum, Rox. Coram, tab. 275. 



^ M. Desvaux, in a dissertation on the geuus Musa {jn Jouni. de Botanique 

 appl. vo\. i,p. 1), lias come to tlie same conclusion respecting the original 

 country of the cultivated Banana, and also that its numerous varieties are 

 reducible to one species. In this dissertation he takes a view of the floral en- 

 velope of Musa peculiar to himself. The perianthium in this genus 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 en- 

 veloping 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 Orohidere, 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 oiTioxhnvgh, {Plants of Coromand. 3, tab. '223), and in the flower of 

 Musa figured by Plumier, {Ifov. Gen. t. 34), but still more by the irregularity 

 confined to the inner series in Strelitzia, and by the near approach to regularity, 

 even in this series, in Ravenala (or Urania), both of which belong to the same 

 natural order. ' Travels, vol. 5, p. 36. 



