(38)
Part II.—Ganja as an article of excise.
CHAPTER I.— DESCRIPTION OF THE HEMP-PLANT.
(Cannabis sativa,L . )
The hemp plant is a tall, erect herb growing from 3 to 8 or 10 feet high
when wild ; when cultivated as a fibre plant it rarely exceeds 6 feet, and is
usually only from 4 to 5 feet high when grown for gánjá. The wild plant and
that cultivated for fibre does not, as a rule, branch till within a short distance
from the top ; in these cases the plants grow either close together or in company
with other herbaceous plants ; in the case of the plant cultivated for g á n j á
the individuals being carefully transplanted and separated from each other by
considerable intervals, a branching habit is developed, and a conical shape,
somewhat resembling a small cypress, is assumed by it. Later in the season,
when all the lower branches have been removed by the cultivator, the distinctive
shape of the plant as it is reaped, somewhat resembling a boxwood bush
trimmed in the old Dutch fashion, is the result.
The lower leaves may or may not be opposite, a tendency that is greater
in male than in female plants ; the rest are alternate and have long stalks with
palmate blades, with 5 to 9 or even 11 segments, along the stein and. large branches.
The uppermost branch leaves have, however, often only 3 segments, and those
immediately under the flower spikes are simple. The segments are lanceolate
and have serrated edges. At the base of the leaf stalk there are free lateral
stipules.
The sexes being distinct, the two must be described separately. The male,
not to be met with in gánjá fields, is never seen branched throughout like
the cultivated female. The individual flowers are shortly stalked and drooping,
and. clustered in small bunches, which are arranged in panicles much shorter
than the leaves. The perianth has five imbricated segments of somewhat unequal
size, with five shortly-stalked erect stamens opposite these ; the anthers are oblong
but slightly narrowed upwards ; there is no trace of even a rudimentary female
flower.
The female plant has stalkless flowers closely set upon small spikelets that
in the wild plant and in the plant cultivated for its fibre are arranged in
panicles almost as long as the leaves, but in the plant grown for gánjá are clustered
in heads distinctly shorter than the leaves. The individual flowers are placed in
the axils of small oval boat-shaped bracts which quite envelope them before fertili-
sation, and cover about two-thirds of the fruit (popularly know as the hemp-seed)
when it is fully ripe. Within these bracts lie the flowers which are surrounded
by a thin membranous entire perianth always difficult to observe and sometimes
quite absent. The ovary is sessile ; and consists of two carpels; the style is
2-armed, the arms being hairy and viscid throughout, and falls off as soon as the
flower is fertilised. There is one ovule which hangs from the top of the ovarian
cavity ; it is found, however, on examination to be attached to the lower of the
two carpels, and does not, as at first sight appears, arise from the edge of this,
but is attached by a thickened nerve to its inner face, and originates from a bud
between the two carpellary leaves.
The nut, popularly the seed, is somewhat flattened sideways, more so in
the plant grown for fibre than in that grown for gánjá ; the perianth is rarely
traceble on the outer side. The kernel is a small pear-shaped body with a very
long stalk by which it is attached to the shell, but bent at the junction of the
stalk and the body, so that the top of the kernel is close to the point of attach-
ment of its stalk to the shell. The embryo within the kernel is similarly curv-
ed; within the body of the kernel lie the two seed leaves, thick, fleshy and flat,
placed. face to face, with their backs looking towards the edges of the nut and.
with primary bud. between them at the base; the stalk of the kernel is occupied.
by the rudimentary stem of the plant accompanied., it is said, by some albumen.
The female plant when cultivated frequently has some abnormal male flow-
ers; generally on a spikelet the two lowest bracts have normal female flowers,