ZEA MAYS, Unn. 



[_Vide Plate V.] 



English, maize ; Vehnaculae, maka, makai, junri or bara juar (in the eastern Districts, where 

 millet is called chota juar). 



Natural order Graminece, tribe Maydeai. A tall annual grass. Stems 4-10 ft. high, smooth, 

 striate, solid, the central portion soft and spongy. Leaves numerous, close together ; sheaths large 

 and full, somewhat compressed, auricled at the base, upper part hairy ; ligule short, truncate, torn ; 

 blade of leaf 1-1^ ft. long, linear lanceolate, acute, smooth ; midrib prominent below ; margins 

 wavy, ciliate. Flowers unisexual ; spikelets monoecious, 2-flowered ; male spikelets many, arranged 

 in pairs on the spike-like branches of a large terminal drooping panicle ; glumes 2, about equal, 

 tinged with purple ; pales 2, nearly equal, falling short of the glumes, lower 3-nerved, upper 2-nerved 

 and with inflexed margins ; lodicules fleshy, truncate ; stamens 3, protruded ; female spikelets nearly 

 sessile, closely arranged in pairs on a thick spongy axis, forming a compact cylindrical spike sur- 

 rounded at the base by broad imbricated bracts, upper flower of spikelet barren ; glumes 2, broad, 

 thick and fleshy at the base, the lower emarginate, ciliate, the upper truncate ; pales 2, lower broad 

 and blunt, the upper much longer, closely adhering to the ovary ; lodicules none ; ovary sessile, 

 ovoid, styles very long, filiform, drooping. Fruit (the grain) roundish or reniform, compressed, 

 smooth, shining, yellow white red or spotted. 



Maize is unJoabtedly an introduction from America, and its cultivation is of recent 

 date compared with that of the other cereal crops. Possibly for this reason it does not 

 appear to have developed any well marked varieties except perhaps in the eastern Dis- 

 trictSj where its cultivation is attended by more care than it generally receives. So far 

 as the colour of the grain is concerned there are endless varieties, and the cobs may be 

 of any tint from a dark purplish red, through yellow and orange, to a pure white. But 

 the most important variety is that grown in Jaunpur and Azamgarh, in which the cobs 

 are of double the usual length, and the plants of taller growth than the ordinary. The 

 grain of this variety is, however, nearly a month longer in maturing. 



The total area under maize in the 30 temporarily settled N.-W. Provinces Districts 

 may be put at 7 lakhs of acres, or 3 per cent, on the total cropped area. Its cultivation 

 is spread over the whole area of the Provinces with the exception of Bundelkhand, in 

 which it is hardly known. It reaches its maximum in Gorakhpur and Basti. There are, 

 however, considerable differences between the area under maize in closely adjacent Dis- 

 tricts, which can only be explained on the supposition that its cultivation has hardly yet 

 lost novelty and is still on the increase. Thus in Cawnpore the area under maize in 

 1880 is returned as 28,233 acres, while in Fatehpur it is only 187 acres. 



Maize is a kharif crop and ranks next after broad-casted rice in the rapidity with 

 which it comes to maturity. It is sown, as a rule, when the rains break, but in localities 



* References :— Linn. Sp. Pi. Ed. I. 971 ; Roxb. Fl. Ind. III. 568 ; DC. Geogr. Bot. ii. 942 ; Bonafous Hist. Mais. tt. 

 1—12 ; Bentley and Trimen Med. PI. 296 ; Powell Punj. Prod. 230. 



