'^seiriimi!'"'}  Source  of  the  Radix  Qalangm  Minoris.  407 
Wight  and  Miquel,  and  the  very  useful  "Prodromus  MonographigD 
Scitaminearum"  of  Prof.  Horaninow,  published  at  St.  Petersburg  in 
1862.  With  these  somewhat  slender  adminicular  I  was  soon  satisfied 
that  the  Galangal  was  either  referable  or  else  very  closely  allied  to 
A.  calcarata^  Rose,  (which  Roxburgh  states  to  have  been  introduced 
from  China  into  the  Calcutta  garden) ;  and  though  I  found  some 
discrepancies  between  the  Kwangtung  specimens  and  the  description 
of  A,  calcarata  drawn  up  from  the  living  plant  by  Roxburgh,^  whose 
accuracy  is  so  well  known,  yet  these  were  apparently  so  few  *and 
unimportant  that  my  chief  ground  of  hesitation  as  to  their  identity 
was  the  extreme  improbability  that  the  rhizome  of  a  plant  widely 
cultivated  within  the  tropics,  and  growing  and  flowering  luxuriantly 
in  the  Calcutta  and  also,  according  to  Thwaites,t  in  the  Peradenia 
garden,  should  have  remained  for  so  long  a  period  unrecognized,  if 
really  the  same  as  the  Lesser  Galangal  of  commerce. 
It  being  evident  that  this  question,  of  so  much  interest  in  itself, 
could  not  be  solved  with  the  means  at  hand,  whilst  an  approximate 
judgment  would  be  valueless,  I  determined  to  let  the  matter  lie  over 
until  I  had  access  to  more  complete  materials. 
Since  then  I  have  received,  through  the  kindness  of  Mr.  Hanbury, 
a  sketch,  with  a  single  flower  colored,  of  the  plate  of  A.  calcarata, 
given  in  Roscoe's  "  Scitaminese,"  and  a  full-colored  copy  of  that  in 
the  second  volume  of  the  "Botanical  Register;"  whilst  my  ever 
liberal  friend,  Dr.  Thwaites,  has  sent  me  living  rhizomes  of  the  same 
species,  whence  have  been  reared  fine  healthy  plants,  though  they 
have  not  as  yet  flowered,  and,  besides,  copious  specimens  both  of  the 
flowering  plant  for  the  herbarium,  and  of  the  dried  mature  rhizomes. 
Mr.  Taintor's  Galangal  plants  have  also  again  blossomed  under  cul- 
ture, but  set  no  fruit  ;J  so  that  fresh  flowering  specimens  of  A.  calca- 
rata^  and  fruit  of  both  species  being  alone  wanting,  I  may  claim  to 
have  had  at  my  disposal  as  good  materials  for  comparison  as  ordinarily 
fall  to  the  lot  of  a  descriptive  botanist.  I  have,  to  the  best  of  my 
ability,  made  a  careful  and  exact  comparative  examination  of  living 
flowerless  plants  of  each  kind  (including  the  rhizome),  and  of  the 
mature  rhizome  of  each  ;  whilst  I  have  compared  the  fresh  and  also 
*  Flora  Indica,  ed.  Carey,  vol.  1,  p.  69. 
t  Enum.  Pi.  Zeyl.  p.  320. 
X  Zingiberaceous  plants,  when  under  cultivation,  even  in  localities  where  they 
are  native,  are  far  less  disposed  to  fruit  than  the  same  species  in  a  wild  state, 
the  flowers  usually  dropping  off  as  soon  as  they  fade. 
