446 FiKi.ij Columbian Museum — Botany, Vol. I. 



They sell for from one up to ten cents apiece. The sea-grape 

 {^Coccoloba uvifera) bears clusters of egg-shaped, plum-colored fruits, 

 about the size of small plums, with a very astringent, rank taste. 

 They are said to make a good jelly and preserve. The alligator pear 

 {Persia gratissima) is used extensively as a vegetable, being eaten raw 

 with salt and pepper. The flesh is yellowish, of a buttery consist- 

 ency, and mild flavor, somewhat resembling pumpkin. Of the well- 

 known fruits, the varieties are excellent. The oranges are of 

 exquisite flavor and good size, though there is only one estate 

 (Spring Gardens) where orange culture is engaged in to any great 

 extent. Bananas, known locally as " figs," are of unsurpassed 

 quality and are grown extensively at Little La Grange and, Canaan. 

 The limes are far better, and, consequently, are used much more than 

 lemons. The pineapples are of good size and unusually fine flavor, 

 most of the varieties being yellow-fleshed. There is no reason why 

 St. Croix should not furnish the New York markets with this fruit, 

 as it thrives on soil that will not grow cane. 



The various insurrections, the abolition of slavery in 1848, the 

 fall in the price of sugar and cotton after our civil war in America, 

 and the impoverishment of the soil have diminished the prosperity of 

 the island, but the future is bright. American ideas and American 

 energy can reclaim the barren places and make St. Croix one of the 

 great tropic fruit markets of the world. 



BOTANICAL HISTORY. 



According to Prof. Ignatius Urban, from whose exhaustive work* 

 the following historic, biographic and bibliographic account of the 

 botanical work done upon the island of St. Croix has been compiled, 

 the study of its flora began about the year 1650 with the investigations 

 of Jean Baptiste Du Tertre: 



1650-56. Tertrk His'j-. z\nt. — Du Tertrk: Histoire generate des 

 Antilles habitees par les Francais, enrichie de cartes et de figures. 

 Paris, 1667-71, 4 vols. 4°: vol. 1 (1667), 535 p. , 3 tab. : II (1667), 

 539 P-. 13 tab.; Ill (1671), 317 p., 3 tab.; IV (1671), 362 p., 5 

 tab. (Bibl. Kruget Urb.). — Primum produit Parisiis 1654, i vol. 

 (ex ipso). 



The author, Jean Baptiste du Tertre of the Order of Dominicans, 

 after a long sojourn in French Antilles, issued (1654) a book under 



♦Symbols AntillansE, 3.1:14-152. 



