24 



Plantain and Banana. 



The sweet bananas by many authors are referred to Musa sapientum 

 and the vegetable-like fruits or plantains to M. paradisiaca There are, 

 however, no characters that can be clearly defined as separating the two. 

 Roxburgh, who paid particular attention to both the native and cultivated 

 bananns and plantains of India, pronounces both to be varieties of one 

 species found wild in the hilly districts of East Bengal, and which 

 he calls M. sapientum. R. Brown (Tuckey's Congo, App. 471) states 

 " there is no circumstance in the structure of any of the states of 

 the banana or plantain cultivated in India or the islands of equinoctial 

 Asia to prevent their being all considered as merely varieties of one 

 and the same species, namely, Musa sapientum ; that their reduction 

 to a single species is even confirmed by the multitude 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." Loureiro {Fl. Coch. 792) says the same 

 thing ; as does Desvaux {Journ. de Bot. (1814) Vol. IV. p. 5). 

 Sir William Hooker {Bot. Mag. tab. 5402) states that the flowers 

 of the bananas and plantains cultivated at Kew afford no character 

 to distinguish them. 



As to question of origin, A. de Candolle, following R. Brown, is of 

 opinion that all evidence hitherto available points to "a primitive 

 existence in Asia, and to a diffusion contemporary with or even 

 anterior to that of the human race." 



Alphonse de Candolle {Cult. Plants, pp. 306-308) discusses the 

 origin and distribution of the banana as follows : — 



" The antiquity and wild character of the banana in Asia are incon- 

 testable facts. There are several Sanscrit names. The Greeks, Latins, 

 and Arabs have mentioned it as a remarkable Indian fruit tree. Pliny 

 speaks of it distinctly. He says that the Greeks of the expedition of 

 Alexander saw it in India, and he quotes the name pala which still 

 persists in Malabar. Sages reposed beneath its shade and ate of its 

 fruit. Hence the botanical name Musa sapientum. Musa is from the 

 Arabic nxouz or mouwz, which we find as early as the thirteenth century 

 in Ebu Baithar. The specific name 'paradisiaca comes from the 

 ridiculous hypothesis which made the banana figure in the story of Eve 

 and of Paradise." 



Again, " there is an immense number of varieties of the banana in 

 the south of Asia, both on the islands and on the continent ; the 

 cultivation of these varieties dates in India, in China, and in the 

 Archipelago, from an epoch impossible to realise ; it even spread 

 formerly into the islands of the Pacific, and to the west coast of 

 Africa ; lastly, the varieties bore distinct names in the most separate 

 Asiatic languages, such as Chinese, Sanskrit, and Malay." 



The probable introduction to eastern tropical America is thus 

 summed up :— 



" The culture of the banana may be said to be recent in the greater 

 part of America, for it dates but from little more than three centuries. 

 Piso says positively that it was imported into Brazil, and has no 

 Brazilian name. He does not say whence it came. According to 

 Oviedo, the species was brought to San Domingo from the Canaries. 

 This fact and the silence of Hernandez, generally so accurate about the 



