142 



and along with tlie taro, yam and banana furnishes tlie daily food of 

 Oceanica. When the pioneer Europeans in the Pacific began to find 

 cluster after cluster of tropical islands full of new things of ethnologi- 

 cal and biological interest, nothing more worthy of mention was seen 

 than this new fruit, or rather vegetable, which was produced in abun- 

 dance practically all the year with no cultural effort on the part of the 

 native beyond the original planting. From the time of its earliest 

 authenticated mention it became an object of curiosity and inquiry, 

 until as an indirect result of Captain Cook's splendid efforts between 

 1769 and 1777 in charting the unknown ocean, an expedition was sent 

 out by the English crown to obtain this valuable food-staple for His 

 Majesty's most loyal West Indian subjects. The mutiny of the 

 Bounty, with the subsequent founding of the Utopian community on 

 Pitcairn's Island by the reformed mutineer Adams, was the result of 

 this first attempt at introduction into the A.merican tropics ; but suc- 

 cess was spelled a few years later when Bligh, who also commanded 

 the former expedition, made the trip safely from Tabiti in the Society 

 Islands to St. Vincent and Jamaica in the West Indies, with a cargo 

 of the precious trees. The existence of a record of a still earlier, but 

 half-forgotten, introduction of the seeded fruit into the West Indies 

 through a captured French vessel, and a knowledge of the fact that 

 the fruit failed completely to meet expectations as a source of food 

 supply in it new home, renders its history fascinating; and this in- 

 terest is still further strengthened when we reflect that it has not yet 

 reached its decline, but has a potential future as a food plant in our 

 newly- acquired tropical islands, in which it has never been properly 

 exploited or appreciated. 



BOTANICAL DESCRIPTION. 



The breadfruit tree {Artoearpus communis) is botanically a member 

 of the mulberry family (MoracecB), and is related to the Central Ameri- 

 can rubber tree {Castilla elastica) and to the common osage orange 

 {Toxylon pomiferum) of temperate regions. The large tropical genus 

 Ficus, which includes the fig of commerce, is also not far removed 

 from it in botanical relationship. The tree attains a height of from 

 30 to 60 feet, according to soil and climate, having a diameter ranging 

 from one to three feet. The straight trunk, with its rough yellowish 

 or grayish bark, rises clear from the ground for 10 or 15 feet before 

 the first wide-spreading horizontal branches are met with ; the top of 

 the tree is spreading, in general outline roughly cone-shaped, the 

 lower branches being the longest. The tree furnishes a good shade, 

 which is sometimes utilized in coffee and cacao plantations as well as 

 in gardens and about houses. The limbs are, however, too easily 

 broken by the wind to make it a good plantation shade tree. 



The leaves are large, alternate, and vary in siz^ and shape on the 

 same as well as on different trees. The size ranges from a foot to 2 or 

 even 3 feet in length, and from 10 to 18 or more inches in width ; in 

 outline they are ovate, cuneate and entire at base, but with the upper 

 part pinnately cleft into 6-12 more or less deep, rounded incisions. 



The fruits are borne on solitary peduncles produced from the axils 

 of the leaves near the ends of the branches. The buds are included 

 within the same enveloping leaf. The male flowers are densely packed 



