404 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The fruits of palms with which people of the temperate regions 

 are best acquainted are dates and coco nuts. But these particular 

 fruits are known chiefly because, besides being available as fruits, they 

 are capable of being transported long distances and of being readily 

 kept for a long time without danger of decay. In their native tropical 

 countries many other palms yield valuable fruits but they do not, as 

 a rule, admit of transportation or delay in using. 



In the Amazonas valley especially, the inhabitants make a delight- 

 ful beverage, known as assai, from the fruit of the assai palm (Euterpe 

 oleracea). A stranger visiting the market in Para for the first time 

 is impressed by the quantities of this thick, purple, chocolate-like 

 fluid on sale. In appearance it is rather repulsive at first, but it im- 

 proves greatly upon acquaintance. From the fruit of the haccdha palm 

 is made a beverage very like that of the assai. A similar drink, but 

 of a milky color, is made of the fruit of the piassdha on the upper Rio 



Fig. 20. The Nut of a Palm used for Jewelry. 



aSTegro. A drink is make from the mirity * palm in quite a different 

 manner : the tree is cut down and a hole cut in the upper side of the 

 prostrate trunk. This opening soon fills with a nearly transparent 

 liquid very like the milk of the coco nut. When allowed to stand and 

 ferment this makes the murity wine — an intoxicating beverage. 

 Along the coast south of Pernambuco, and especially in the State of 

 Bahia, is a palm, known as the dende, the pulp of whose fruit is used 

 in making oil that is extensively used in cooking. This oil has a 

 bright orange color and is prepared by bruising the pulp of the nuts, 

 putting it in cold water and skimming off the oil as it rises to the 

 surface, after which it is boiled down. Illuminating oil is likewise 

 made from the kernel of the dende nuts. 



Many of the palm nuts are covered by edible pulp. Several species 

 of Bactris bear fruits the size of a walnut whose acid pulp is very 

 pleasant when ripe. In the Amazonas valley is a palm known as the 



* This palm, the Mauritia vinifera, is called mirity and murity in the 

 Amazonas region, but further south it is called burity; in the Paraguay valley 

 region it is called mburity. 



