MUSA ROSACEA. 
59 
as it approaches the margin, when a still deeper purple stripe is formed round the 
whole, extending itself over the leaf stalk, until it is finally lost in the stem. 
Flowers, mostly like the preceding, except the durability of the stamens, which 
are in this deciduous. Fruit something shorter, and rounder than that of the 
preceding, and with a softer pulp of a more delicious flavour. This species is of 
extremely easy culture, and will grow equal in size to those produced in the soil of 
India, if the treatment recommended for M. paradisiaca is faithfully applied to it. 
The rapidity of its growth when the roots have plenty of room for extension, and 
the plant a lofty house for the spread of its leaves, is very surprising. In the 
beginning of May, 1835, we had occasion to remove a plant then about four feet 
high, with two or three imperfect and sickly looking leaves, from a small stove in 
which it had been kept during the winter and spring months, into one more spacious 
and. lofty. At this removal, the roots were placed in a good sized box of about 
three feet in depth, by two and a half in width, and filled with light rich compost, 
well watered. It had not been in this situation long before it began to vegetate 
freely, throwing up more healthy and perfect leaves, and in the course of a short 
time its growth became so rapid, that, before six months had elapsed, the extremities 
of the leaves had reached the glass at the roof, and were considerably injured by 
forcing themselves against the rafters and bars of the lights. The house from the 
plane on which the box was placed, to the centre of the roof, which is double, 
measured nearly twenty feet, thus allowing the plant and box when first introduced 
to be about five feet, which was the outside ; the plant in six months grew to the 
astonishing height of twenty feet, which averages its growth at two feet and a half 
per month, or more than seven inches per week. At the present time, the whole 
plant from the surface of the soil to the centre of the leaves is sixteen feet, the 
stalk at the base in diameter exceeds six inches, and the leaves from the two 
opposite extremities equal the whole length of the plant ; and what makes this 
appear the more extraordinary is, that, during this incessant growth, it threw out at 
different times three or four strong suckers, one of which was allowed to remain on, 
and is at this time attached to its parent, to which it is not a great deal inferior. In 
the whole course of its growth it received precisely the same treatment as that recom- 
mended for the species paradisiaca, which has proved satisfactory. If we are 
fortunate, we anticipate seeing it laden with its wonderful fruit towards the termina- 
tion of the ensuing summer. 
MUSA ROSACEA; OR, ROSE-COLOURED PLANTAIN TREE. 
This species has been long known in the stoves of this country for its magnifi- 
cent foliage and lively flowers. It was found in the Mauritius, whence it was 
introduced to this country about 1805. In speaking of the M. paradisiaca it was 
observed, in reference to that species, that it bore much resemblance to this ; so 
much as not unfrequently to confound the two ; but was distinguished by the 
