20 8 
Baker —A Synopsis of the 
Hort. t. 674. Whole plant reaching a height of 10-12 ft. 
Trunk much dilated, 7-8 ft. in circumference at the base, 
narrowed to 3 ft. below the leaves. Leaves oblong, narrowed 
to the base, bright green on both sides, 5 ft. long, 1 J ft. broad ; 
free petiole very short, deeply channelled. Panicle at first 
globose, a foot in diameter, finally drooping, a third the length 
of the trunk ; bracts orbicular, dull claret-brown, reaching a 
foot in length and breadth ; flowers in two dense rows of 
10-15 each. Ovary white, cylindrical, above an inch long. 
Calyx whitish, as long as the ovary, formed of three loosely 
cohering linear segments. Petal short, tricuspidate, with a large 
linear central cusp. Fruit oblong, subcoriaceous, 3 in. long, 
1 1 in. diam. Seeds very numerous, subglobose, angled by 
pressure, J-J in. diam., smooth, brown. Western Ghauts of 
the Bombay peninsula. Frequent in cultivation : introduced by 
Dr. J. Anderson to the Calcutta Botanic Garden in 1800. 
Yields a poor fibre. 
7. M. nepalensis, Wall, in Roxb. FI. Ind. edit. Wall, and Carey, II, 
492. Trunk short, ovoid, 2 ft. in diameter at the base. 
Leaves rather smaller than in M. superba , and somewhat 
glaucous. Panicle at first dense, a foot in diameter, finally 
short, drooping ; bracts dull purple, ovate, the lower \ foot 
long; flowers 7-8 in a row. Calyx, petal, fruit and seeds like 
those of M. superba . Lower hills of Nepal, in dense shaded 
forests, Wallich . Described principally from two large un- 
published drawings of Wallich, now at Kew. Not known in 
cultivation. 
Subgenus Eumusa. 
8. M. lasiocarpa, Franchet, in Journ. de Bot. 1889, 329, with figure. 
Whole plant 1-2 ft. long. Stems sending out at the base 
a stout horizontal rhizome. Leaves oblong-lanceolate, about 
a foot long, very glaucous, narrowed at the base to a petiole 
which is rather shorter than the blade, the broad truncate bases 
of the old leaves persisting round the base of the stem. Panicle 
dense, erect, oblong, under a foot long ; bracts thin, yellowish, 
persistent, the upper ovate, the lower ovate-lanceolate. Flowers 
4-8 in a cluster, above an inch long. Calyx 5 dobed. Petal 
shorter, ovate-oblong. Fruit oblong-trigonous, dry, pubescent, 
