262 



THE GARDENER'S MONTHLY 



{September, 



world, and that they enter so largely in the 

 decoration of parlors, halls and conservatories, 

 it may not be amiss to make their friends bet- 

 ter acquainted with the important part they 

 play in the economy of nature and of the rela- 

 tion they bear to the human race, apart from 

 their imposing grandeur and sublinie beauty. 

 In those countries, where the permanent high 

 temperature of both atmosphere and soil pre- 

 vent man from becoming as industrious as is 

 natural and necessary for him to be in the tem- 

 perate zone, nature has produced plants which 

 yield almost without labor all man needs to 

 maintain a life of dolce far niente. Besides the 

 banana, no plant occupies such an important 

 position as the palm. Furnishing food, drink, 

 clothing, building material, condiments and in 

 short everything man needs where so little is 

 required to satisfy his primary necessities. 



Since the space allowed in this magazine is 

 not sufficient to exhaust the subject, I will only 

 mention some few of the most useful mem- 

 bers of this aristocratic family, the princes of 

 the vegetable kingdom, as Humbolt called them. 



At the head of them all stands indisputably 

 the Cocoa Palm, of which not less than twelve 

 different species with numerous varieties are 

 known. They are perhaps the most cosmopoli- 

 tan, since they grow in Asia, America, Africa 

 and Australia, but principally on the Indian 

 Archipelago and the islands of the Pacific 

 Ocean, thriving best near the coast, a few feet 

 above high tide, but occur also in the interior of 

 the continents, in the cultivated districts of the 

 Magdalena River, near Patna, in Bengal, 

 Merida, in Yucatan, and under the equator, 

 even as high as 3000 to 4000 feet above the sea. 

 In Asia they grow in the West of India as far 

 north as 22° N. ; on the coast of Bengal and 

 China they extend their limits to 25" S., to 

 which degree they also go in Australia. Thus 

 they inhabit a zone of 50° on the west of 

 America, whilst on the east of our continent 

 and the west of Africa they become scarcer 

 and their range is considerably reduced. They 

 are of rapid growth, attaining a height of from 

 sixty to one hundred feet, and acquire their 

 greatest capacity of bearing at the age of from 

 twenty to sixty years, after which period they 

 lose their elastic appearance and upright posi- 

 tion, becoming crooked and unsightly. Every 

 part of them is useful. The leaves, fifteen to 

 twenty feet long, are employed in the manufac- 

 ture of baskets, mats, screens, parasols, hats 



and roofing. Both in Europe and in this coun- 

 try the fibre of the nuts is extensively used in 

 the manufacture of hats, mats and brushes. 

 The young and tender leaves, when cooked, 

 furnish a vegetable dish similar to our cabbage. 

 The kernel of the nut gives the well-known 

 cocoanut oil, and the curry or mullagatawny, is 

 a dish indispensible for the table of a Cingalese. 

 When the tree becomes too old to bear any 

 more fruit it furnishes that valuable wood known 

 as Palmyra-wood. The wine made from the 

 juice of the flowering shaft called Toddy, when 

 in full fermentation is much relished by the in- 

 habitants of East India. The species called by 

 botanists Cocos nucifera being the most useful 

 of the tribe is cultivated on the Canary Islands. 

 In Brazil we meet the C. coronata, C. capitata, 

 C. schizophylla and C. oleracea. In New 

 Grenada and Venezuela C. butyracea, which, 

 when felled and a cavity cut into the trunk 

 yields an average of eighteen bottles of wine, 

 said to be equal to the best champagne. C. 

 guinensis and C. aculeata furnish that valuable 

 article of African commerce, the genuine palm 

 oil. 



Next to the Cocos we find the Areca palm, 

 with twenty species, belonging exclusively to 

 the Eastern Hemisphere. Of these the most 

 important is the A. Catechu, a slender, most 

 lovely and graceful tree about fifty feet high, 

 furnishing the catechu or Japan earth, the ex- 

 tract of the fruit. It is an adjunct to every In- 

 dian and Cingalese village whenever it can be 

 made to grow, but being naturally a lover of 

 moisture it finds its most congenial home in the 

 well watered valleys of Ceylon. The nut forms 

 the principal part of the material for betel 

 chewing, a luxury in which the Cingalese and 

 Tamil people, old and young of both sexes 

 freely indulge. With this we must mention the 

 A. oleracea or Cabbage Palm. Then the 

 Arenga with five species of which the most im- 

 portant is A. saccharifera_, yielding palm wine 

 from which the Batavian Arac (Aarc de Soa) is 

 distilled. In Malacca it is cultivated for the 

 purpose of making sugar, and from the marrow, 

 sago. Next come the Borassus Palms, growing 

 both in Asia and Africa, about seventy feet 

 high. B. ^thiopium, the Delep Palm of Nu- 

 bia, valued for its fruit and the roots of the 

 young plant which are eaten. This palm gives 

 character to the whole country South of the 

 Lake Tsad, and is to the inhabitants of middle 

 Africa of the same importance as the Date 



