60 CITRUS AURANTIUM. 



neously in East Florida, and on the Island (tf Cuba. Oth. Myrde-hdvcd 

 lljg(ir(i(k\ witli small, very compact, ovate, sharp-pointed leaves, and small, 

 ronnd I'rnit. If well cultivated, it is generally both in llower and fruit at the 

 same time. On this account, and its dwarfy habit, it is a very common object 

 in house.s and gardens. It is said to be employed by the Chinese gardeners as 

 an edirnig of llower-bcds, in the same manner as the dwarf box in Europe and 

 America.* 



Geogrnphy and History. The orange is believed to have been originally a 

 native of the warmt^r jxirts of Asia, and has long since ])een acclimated to the 

 shores of the Red and Mediterranean Seas, to the temperate and tropical isles of 

 the oceans and seas, and to the warmer portions of Africa and America. It is 

 especially cultivated with a view to prolit, and abounds in Portugal, Spain, 

 France, Italy. Greece, Turkey, Egypt, northern Africa, and many of the islands 

 adjacent to those countries ; also in the Azores, Brazil, the island of Cuba, and 

 East Florida. 



At the time of the crusades for the recovery of Syria from the dominion of the 

 Saracens, oranges were found abundant in that country. Though they were, in 

 reality, cultivated trees, the beanly and excellence of their fruit, by the aid of 

 romance and credulity, naturally led the infatuated adventurers to believe and 

 state that they jwere indigenous, and formed a part of the glories of the " Holy 

 Land." The fables of the profane writers, and the ambiguity of the descriptions 

 of vegetables in Holy Writ, helped further to confirm this opinion. As the 

 oranges were in the form of apples, and the colour of gold, it was easy to make 

 them the "golden apples of the garden of the Hesperides ;" and the only point 

 that remained to be settled, was to fix the locality of that enchanting and imag- 

 inary abode. The authority of Moses was brought into requisition to confirm the 

 existence of the Syrian fruit, even at the time when the children of Israel were 

 wandering in the wilderness ; and the boughs of the " goodly trees" home in the 

 procession commanded in the twenty-third chapter of Leviticus, were considered 

 no less than those of the orange. The mala medica of the Romans, which 

 is mentioned by Virgil, and afterwards by Palladio and others; the kitron 

 of the Greeks ; and the citrus of Josephus, were all understood to mean the 

 same fruit. Although there was much written upon the subject, there was no 

 attempt to examine the authorities with that minuteness which the search of 

 truth demanded. This opinion prevailed until the XlXth century, when the 

 history of this fruit was carefully investigated by Galesio. He maintains that 

 the orange, instead of being found in the north of Africa, in Syria, or even in 

 Media, whence the Romans must have obtained their " mala medica," was not in 

 that part of India, watered by the Indus, at the time of Alexander the Great's 

 expedition, as it is not mentioned by Nearchus, the commander of the fleet, 

 among the fruits and productions of that country. It is not noticed either by 

 Arrian, Diodorus, or by Pliny; and even so late as the year 1300, Pietro di 

 Cuescenga, a senator of Bologna, who wrote on agriculture and vegetable pro- 

 ductions, does not make the least mention of the orange. 



The first distinct notice of this fruit on record, is by Avicenna, an Arabian phy- 

 sician, who flourished in the Xth century. He not only describes oleum de cit- 

 rangyla, (oil of oranges,) and oleum de citrangulorum sem^itiibus, (oil of orange- 

 seeds,) but speaks of citric acid (acid of citrons.) According to Galesio, the 

 Arabs, when they entered India, found the orange tribes there, further inland 

 than Alexander had penetrated; and they brought them to Europe by two 

 routes, the sweet ones through Persia to Syria, and thence to the shores of 

 Italy and the south of France, and the bitter ones, by Arabia, Egypt, and the 

 north of Africa, to Spain and Portugal. 



* Penny Cyclopaedia, vol. vii., p. 214. 



