366 PROFESSOR BALFOUR ON THE ASAFCTIDA PLANT. 
Narthex Asafoetida.—Herba gigantea Tibetica; radice crassa, fibris intertextis 
rigidis coronata; caule robusto, ramoso; foliis bipinnatis, laciniis lineari-oblongis 
obtusis, integris vel sinuatis, decurrentibus, glabris vel pubescentibus; petiolis latis, — 
amplis, vaginantibus, ventricosis, interdum aphyllis; umbellis compositis; involucris 
nullis; floribus flavis, interdum unisexualibus vel sterilibus. It is probably Asa- 
fetida Disgunensis, or Hingisch of Kamprer, Amoen. Exot. p. 535. Ferula Asa- 
fetida, Linn., Mat. Med. p. 79; D.C. Prod. iv. 173; Linpt., Fl. Med. p. 45. 
The plant grows in sunny spots among stones, in the valley of Astore or 
Hussorah, near the Indus, beyond Kashmire. Fatconerr gathered it in fruit near 
Boosthon, on 21st September 1838. By the Dardohs or Daradri it is called Sip 
gr Sup, and the young shoots are employed as a culinary vegetable. 
The following description is taken from the plants which were grown in the 
Botanic Garden,—Herbaceous plants attaining a height of between 9 and 10 feet, 
and giving out a strong alliaceous odour when any part is bruised. Flowering 
stem erect, terete, striated, about a foot in circumference at the base, giving off 
flowering branches bearing compound umbels. After the plant flowers and fruits 
it dies, but the period of flowering is often long delayed. In the case of the plants 
in the Botanic Garden it was postponed for sixteen years. It is therefore a 
monocarpic plant, with the period of flowering indefinite. The cotyledons are. 
linear, from 2 to 24 inchesin length. The roots are large and thickened, fusiform, 
dark-coloured externally, and white within, about a foot and a half in length, — 
and about a foot in circumference at their thickest part, exhaling a very strong and 
enduring asafoetida smell. Some of them were laid for a few weeks in a room last — 
year, and, although removed five or six months ago, the odour still remains. The 
crown of the roots is covered with a mass of fibrous matter. During the first year — 
of growth, the root attains the thickness of the thumb. It continues to increase ~ 
annually, and sometimes attains the thickness of a man’s calf, or even his thigh. — 
The radical leaves, which are the only ones produced on non-flowering specimens, — 
are about 18 inches in length, but in flowering specimens they are smaller; they 
are bipinnately cut, and have a pzeony-like appearance; the segments are linear, 
ligulate, and obtuse, entire or sinuately lobed. The lower leaves in the fruiting 
plant had compound laminz 13 or 14 inches long, borne on evident rounded 
petioles, which, at the base, had short sheaths, nearly surrounding the whole — 
stem; the lowest four leaves did not bear umbels in their axil; all the rest did. 
In proceeding upwards on the flowering stem, the laminz diminished in size, while 
the sheathing part of the petiole or the pericladium increased—the laminze becom- 
ing 3 or 4 inches long, the sheaths 7 to 9 inches in length by 8 in breadth. In 
the upper part of the axis the sheathing petiole represents the whole leaf; and 
the sheaths near the top are reduced to abortive membranous scales, about 1 inch 
in length, and finally disappear, when the umbels at the summit are reached. | 
The large sheathing inflated petioles gave a peculiar character to the plants. 

