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cessfully by those who have more leifure than I fhall ever enjoy, I fent you with an interesting paffage from one of his prefaces, to which I should barely have referred you, if his great work were not unfortunately confined, from its rarity, to very few hands. He informs us, in an introduction to his third volume, "that feveral Indian physicians "and Bráhmens had compofed by his order, a catalogue of the most ce"lebrated plants, which they distributed according to their times of bloffoming and feeding, to the configuration of their leaves, and to "the forms of their flowers and fruit; that, at the proper seasons he gave copies of the list to several intelligent men, of whom he sent parties into different forests, with instructions to bring him, from all "quarters, fuch plants as they faw named, with their fruit, flowers, and "leaves, even though they should be obliged to climb the most lofty "trees for them; that three or four painters, who lived in his family, "constantly and accurately delineated the fresh plants, of which, in his "prefence, a full defcription was added; that, in the meanwhile, he "had earnestly requested all the princes and chiefs on the Malabar "coaft to fend him fuch vegetables, as were moft diftinguished for use or for elegance, and that not one of them failed to fupply his garden "with flowers, which he fometimes received from the distance of fifty or fixty leagues; that when his herbarifts had collected a fuf"ficient number of plants, when his draughtsmen had sketched their

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figures, and his native botanists had fubjoined their description, he “fubmitted the drawings to a little academy of Pandits, whom he used

to convene for that purpose from different parts of the country; "that his affembly often confifted of fifteen or fixteen learned natives, "who vied with each other in giving correct answers to all his quef"tions concerning the names and virtues of the principal vegetables, " and that he wrote all their answers in his note-book; that he was infinitely delighted with the candid, modeft, amicable, and respect"ful debates of those pagan philofophers, each of whom adduced pas

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fages from ancient books in support of his own opinion, but without any bitterness of contest or the least perturbation of mind; that the "texts, which they cited, were in verse, and taken from books, as they pofitively afferted, more than four thousand years old; that the first "couplet of each fection in thofe books comprised the fynonymous "terms for the plant, which was the subject of it, and that, in the subfequent verfes, there was an ample account of its kind or fpecies, its properties, accidents, qualities, figure, parts, place of growth, time of "flowering and bearing fruit, medical virtues, and more general uses; "that they quoted thofe texts by memory, having gotten them by "heart in their earliest youth, rather as a play than a study, according "to the immemorial usage of such Indian tribes, as are destined by law "to the learned profeffions; and on that fingular law of tribes, pe".culiar to the old Egyptians and Indians, he adds folid and permany "tinent remarks." Now when we complain, and myself as much as any, that we have no leisure in India for literary and philofophical purfuits, we should confider, that VAN RHEEDE was a nobleman at the head of an Indian government in his time very confiderable, and that he fully discharged all the duties of his important station, while he found leisure, to compile, in the manner just described, those twelve large volumes, which LINNAEUS himself pronounces accurate.

CAL. Perianth fpathe-like, but fitting on the germ; tubular, one leaved, broken at the mouth into few irregular fharp toothlets; downy, ftriated; in part coloured, in part femipellucid. COR. One-petaled, villous. Tube fhort, funnel form. Border double. Exterior three parted; coloured like the calyx; divifions oblong, ftriated, internally concave, rounded into flipperlike bags; the twớ

lower

lower divifions, equal, rather deflected; the higher, fomewhat longer, opposite, bent in a contrary direction, terminated with a long point. Interior, two-lipped (unless the upper lip be called the filament); under lip revolute, with a tooth on each fide near the base; twoparted from the middle; divisions axe-form, irregularly end-nicked. Nectaries, two or three honey-bearing, light brown, gloffy bodies at the base of the under lip, just below the teeth; erect, awled, converging into a small cone.

STAM. Filament (unless it be called the upper lip of the interior border), channelled within, fheathing the style; dilated above into the large fleshy anther, if it can justly be so named. Anther oblong, externally convex and entire, internally flat, divided by a deep furrow; each divifion, marked with a perpendicular pollen-bearing line, and ending in a membranous point. PIST. Germ beneath, protuberant, roundish, obscurely three fided, externally soft with down. Style threadform, long as the filament, the top of which nearly closes round it. Stigma headed, per forated.

PER. Capfule (or capfular berry, not bursting in a determinate mode, oblong-roundish, three striped, smooth, crowned with the permanent calyx and corol; with a brittle coat, almost black without, pearly

within.

SEEDS, lopped, with three or four angles, very smooth, enclosed within three oblong, rounded, foft, membranous integuments, conjoined by a branchy receptacle; in each parcel, four or five.

Interior Border of the corol, pink and white; under lip, internally milkwhite, with a rich carmine stripe in each of its divifions. Seeds aromatick, hotter than Cardamoms. Leaves alternate, fheathing, oblong, pointed, keeled, most entire, margined, bright grafs-green above, very smooth; pale fea-green below. Stem compreffed, three or four feet long, bright pink near its base, erect, ending in a beautiful pani

cle.

cle. Peduncles many flowered; bracts few lance-linear, very long, withering. Root fibrous, with two or three bulbous knobs, light brown and fpungy within, faintly aromatick.

Although the Taraca has properties of an Amomum, and appears to be one of those plants, which RUMPHIUS names Globba, yet it has the air of a LANGUAS, the fruit, I believe, of a RENEALMIA, and no exact correfpondence with any of the genera fo elaborately described by KOENIG its effential character, according to RETZ, would confift in its two parted interior border, its channelled filament, and its twocleft anther with pointed divifions.

2. BHU'CHAMPACA:

VULG. Bhuchampac.

LINN. Round-rooted KÆMPFERIA.

CAL. Common Spathe imbricated, many flowered; partial. Perianth one leaved, fmall, thin, obfcure.

COR. One petaled. Tube very long, flender, sub-cylindric below, funnel form above, fomewhat incurved. Border double, each three parted: exterior, divifions lanced, acute, dropping; interior, two higher divifions erect, lapping over, oblong, pointed, fupporting the back of the anther; lower divifion, expanding, deflected, two cleft; fubdivifions broad, axeform, irregularly notched, endnicked, with a point.

STAM. Filament adhering to the throat of the corol, oblong below,

enlarged, and twolobed above, coloured. Anther double, linear, higher than the mouth of the tube, fixed on the lower part of the filament, conjoined round the piftil, fronting the two cleft division of the border.

PIST.

Germ very low near the root, attended with a nectareous gland. Style capillary, very long. Stigma funnel form below, compreffed

above; fanshaped, twolipped, downy, emerging a little from the conjoined anther.

PER. and SEEDS not yet feen.

Scape thickih, very fhort. Corol richly fragrant; tube and exterior border milkwhite, divifions dropping, as if fenfitive, on the slightest touch, and foon yielding to the preffure of the air; interior border purple, the higher divifions diluted, the lower deeply coloured within, variegated near the base. One or two flowers blow every morning in April or May, and wither entirely before sunset: after the Spike is exhausted, rise the large leaves keeled, broad-lanced, membranous nerved. Root with many roundish, or rather spindleshaped bulbs.

This plant is clearly the Benchápo of RHEEDE, whose native assistant had written Bhu on the drawing, and intended to follow it with Champá: the spicy odour and elegance of the flowers, induced me to place this KÆMPFERIA (though generally known) in a series of select Indian plants; but the name Ground CHAMPAC is very improper, fince the true Champaca belongs to a different order and clafs; nor is there any resemblance between the two flowers, except that both have a rich aromatick scent.

Among all the natural orders, there is none, in which the genera feem less precisely ascertained by clear essential characters, than in that, which (for want of a better denomination) has been called fcitamineous; and the judicious RETZ, after confeffing himself rather diffatisfied with his own generick arrangement, which he takes from the border of the corol, from the stamen, and principally from the anther, declares his fixed opinion, that the genera in this order will never be determined with abfolute certainty until all the fcitamineous plants of India fhall be perfectly described.

3. SE'P'HA