400 
The Philippine Journal of Science 
1915 
MUSA SAPIENTUM L. var. SUAVEOLENS (Blanco). Bongolan, bungu- 
lan. Plate XIV, figs. 6-10. 
Musa paradisiaca suaveolens Blanco. 
Plant reaches a height of from 280 to 290 cm and has a 
diameter of from 15 to 16.5 cm at the base; produces from 10 
to 12 rather slender, cylindrical flowering stems in a stool. The 
trunk is characterized by a black epidermis with reddish blotches. 
The leaves are green throughout, less glaucous below; the 
matured blades from 190 to 235 cm long and from 58 to 65 cm 
wide ; firm in texture, not easily broken by the wind ; petiole of 
medium length, from 35 to 40 cm. 
The spathe is from 43 to 45 cm long and from 10 to 12 cm wide, 
longitudinally pitted inside, green and glaucous outside, elon- 
gate-lanceolate, not involute at the tip. The spike bears from 
5 to 7 hands of matured fruits. The time from sprouting to 
flowering is usually twelve months. 
The flowers (Plate XIV, figs. 6-9) are white, with greenish 
peduncle like the lacatan, often 10 to a fascicle, from 0.5 to 7.5 cm 
long and from 1 to 1.5 cm wide; the perigonium with deep sin- 
uses ; the scale is oblong with narrow scarious margin, the apex 
suddenly acute, surface deeply depressed, not deeply shouldered. 
Stamens of the sterile flowers longer than pistil and calyx, two 
or three aborted ; the stigma is somewhat turbinate and lobed. 
The fruits are long, slightly curved and slightly 5-angled, from 
14 to 16 cm in length and from 3 to 4 cm in width, usually 10 
in a hand; average weight of matured fruit, 85.4 grams. The 
skin when ripe is thick, yellow or greenish, often shaded with 
black spots, the pulp is sweet and melting, not fibrous nor coarse, 
creamy at maturity, with an appreciable apple flavor. 
This variety ranks as one of the first-class eating bananas. 
Blanco’s description of this variety is translated as follows: 28 
Fruit. — It is longer than that of the lacatan. 
The cortex is always green like that of the tampohin ; but that of the 
latter does not show small stains somewhat straw-colored at maturity like 
that of the bungulan. The angles are not so noticeable, as in the other 
species; and they almost disappear at complete ripening, as is generally 
the case with all bananas The flesh has a very delicate odor and taste, 
and this banana would be mostly highly esteemed if it were not for the 
fact that there is attributed to it, whether with reason I do not know, the 
property of being extremely cold. T., bungulan. 
Other names for this variety have been given as balungun 
(Vis.), banglana, and tomoc. 
28 Fl. Filip, ed. 2 (1845) 171. 
