66 "fages from ancient books in support of his own opinion, but without 66 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 those books comprised the synonymous "terms for the plant, which was the subject of it, and that, in the subsequent verses, there was an ample account of its kind or species, 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 ufage of fuch Indian tribes, as are deftined by law "to the learned profeffions; and on that fingular law of tribes, pe 66 "culiar to the old Egyptians and Indians, he adds many folid and per "tinent remarks." Now when we complain, and myself as much as any, that we have no leisure in India for literary and philosophical purfuits, we fhould 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. 1. TA'RACA: VULG. Tárac. LINN. Amomum. CAL. Perianth fpathe-like, but fitting on the germ; tubular, one leaved, broken at the mouth into few irregular sharp toothlets; downy, ftriated; in part coloured, in part femipellucid. COR. One-petaled, villous. Tube short, funnel form. Border double. Exterior three parted; coloured like the calyx; divifions oblong, ftriated, internally concave, rounded into flipperlike bags; the two lower lower divifions, equal, rather deflected; the higher, fomewhat longer, oppofite, 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; divifions 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, sheathing 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, obfcurely three fided, externally foft with down. Style threadform, long as the filament, the top of which nearly closes round it. Stigma headed, perforated. 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, sheathing, oblong, pointed, keeled, most entire, margined, bright grass-green above, very smooth; pale fea-green below. 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 spungy 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 defcribed by KOENIG its effential character, according to RETZ, would confist in its two parted interior border, its channelled filament, and its twocleft anther with pointed divifions. CAL. Common Spathe imbricated, many flowered; partial. Perianth one leaved, small, 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, Anther double, linear, enlarged, and twolobed above, coloured. higher than the mouth of the tube, fixed on the lower part of the filament, conjoined round the piftil, fronting the two cleft divifion 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 thickish, very short. Corol richly fragrant; tube and exterior border milkwhite, divifions dropping, as if sensitive, on the flightest 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 funfet: 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 fpicy 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 class; 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 ftamen, 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 shall be perfectly described. 3. SE'P'HA 3. SE'P'HALICA': SYN. Suvahá, Nirgudi, Nilicá, Niváricá. LINN. Sorrowful NYCTANTHES. In all the plants of this fpecies examined by me, the calyx was villous; the border of the corol white, five-parted, each divifion unequally subdivided; and the tube of a dark orange-colour; the ftamens and pistil entirely within the tube; the berries, twin, compreffed, capsular, two-celled, margined, inverse-hearted with a point. This gay tree (for nothing forrowful appears in its nature) fpreads its rich odour to a confiderable distance every evening; but at sunrise it sheds most of its night-flowers, which are collected with care for the use of perfumers and dyers. My Pandits unanimously affure me, that the plant before us is their Sép hálicá, thus named because bees are supposed to sleep on its bloffoms; but Nilicà muft imply a blue colour; and our travellers infist, that the Indians give the names of Párijática or Párijáta to this useful species of Nyctanthes on the other hand, I know that Párijáta is a name given to flowers of a genus totally different; and there may be a variety of this with blueish corols; for it is exprefsly declared, in the Amarcófh, that, when the Sép' hálica has white flowers, it is "named Swétafurafá, and Bhútavés'i.” 4. a. MAGHYA. SYN. Cunda. LINN. Nyctanthes Sambac. See RHEEDE: 6 H. M. tab. 54. Flowers exquifitely white, but with little or no fragrance; ftem, petioles, and calyx very downy; leaves egged, acute; below rather hearted. 6. SEPTALA: SYN. |