Cardamom is the fruit of various East India or Chinese plants of the genera elettari of the ginger family (_Zingiberaceoe_). Especially the most esteemed are those contained in the dried capsules, _E. cardamomum_ of Malabar, which differs from the genus amomum by its elongated filiform tube of the corolla, by the presence of internal lateral lobes in the shape of very small tooth-like processes and by the filaments not being prolonged beyond the anther. All the species are natives of the tropical parts of India. Small or Malabar cardamoms, as they are known commercially, are the rhizomes which are thick, fleshy, or woody and ridged with scars of the attachments of previous leaves, giving off fibrous roots below. Stems, perennial, erect, smooth, jointed, enveloped in the spongy sheaths of the leaves, from six to nine feet high and about one inch thick, round and green and hollow, but with pith within, and resemble our reeds in many respects. The leaves are a half yard long, alternate, sessile in their sheath, entire lanceolate, fine-pointed, pubescent above, silky beneath, sheaths slightly villous with a roundish ligule rising from the mouth, and as broad as a man’s hand. Besides these stalks, there rises from the same root others which are weak and tender and about eight inches high, which produce the flowers, which are small and greenish. Following every flower comes one of the fruits called the great cardamom, which is a light, dry, hollow fruit of a whitish color, and somewhat triangular in shape, and of the size of a small bean, and of a dry substance on the outside, but with several small seeds within, which are reddish in color and very acrid but pleasant to the taste. These fruits are called the lesser cardamoms or cardamom seeds, and they are excellent to strengthen the stomach and to assist digestion. They also are good for disorders of the head and are equal to anything to be had for colics, and are best used by chewing. They are used in whole mixed spices. There are two other kinds of cardamoms known as the middle cardamom, a long fruit, seldom met with, and the great cardamom, generally called “Grain of Paradise.” In the home market three kinds of cardamoms are found under the curious names of “shorts,” “short-longs,” and “long-longs.” Shorts are capsules from a quarter to half an inch long and a quarter of an inch broad, and the longest of the long-longs is about one inch in length. ------------------------------------------------------------------------