.. - . 
THE MUSA, OR PLANTAIN TREE. 
520 
Musa chinensis. 
THE MUSA, OR PLANTAIN TREE. 
The Musas are the representatives of a 
group of plants, or natural order, which, in 
connexion with those represented by the 
arrow-root (Maranta bicolor) and the ginger 
(Zingiber officinale), form a distinct assem- 
blage of monocotyledonous plants, which has 
been called the Amomal alliance, from its con- 
taining the genus Amomum, some species of 
which furnish the cardamoms of medicine. 
The Musas are large growing plants, even 
as cultivated in our hothouses, where they 
have a noble appearance, unexcelled in this 
respect even by the Palms. They are, indeed, 
commonly associated in idea with the Palm 
family, from which, however, they are very 
distinct. The leaves of the Musas are amone; 
the largest with which we are acquainted, 
sometimes measuring many feet in length, and 
two or three feet in width, and mostly of a 
regular oblong figure. Some of the species 
afford a great abundance of valuable food in 
the tropics — such, for instance, as the Banana 
and Plantain ; and a Chinese species, now 
cultivated in our gardens, is eligible as a f'-tiit- 
bearing plant under artificial cultivation. The 
young shoots of the Banana are also eaten as 
a delicate vegetable. The leaves of some of 
the kinds are used for thatching Indian cot- 
tages, and for making baskets ; and one spe- 
47. 
cies ( 31. textilis), which we believe is not 
introduced, yields a most valuable flax, from 
which some of the finest muslins of India are 
prepared. Scarcely any plant shows better 
the nature and the structure of what botanists 
call spiral vessels, that is, slender twisted spiral 
fibres, which occur among the other tissues of 
plants. They are very numerous in these 
plants ; and if the stalk or principal veins of 
any one of the leaves is broken and the two 
pieces pulled apart, they will be seen to be 
united by numbers of these spiral threads, so 
elastic that the pieces may be pulled widely 
asunder without breaking them. They eveu 
exist in such numbers that they are pulled out 
by handfuls, and are said to be collected in the 
West Indies and sold as a kind of tinder. The 
juice of the fruit, as well as the lymph of the 
stems of the Musas, is slightly astringent and 
diaphoretic. 
There are three species which are more 
usually grown in stove collections, and six 
others are recorded as being introduced and 
cultivated; but some of these are seldom seen. 
Musa paradisiaca (common Plantain-tree) 
has an herbaceous stem, rising from twenty to 
thirty feet high, of a light green colour, with 
pale green leaves, in full-grown specimens 
measuring from six to seven feet 
si st 
long, and 
