1885.] 



AND HORTICULTURIST. 



53 



color to the froth. The froth may be made from 

 the green berries, but it is not so highly flavored, 

 and is white in color. Foreigners mix some of 

 the froth with their wine, sweetening with sugar, 

 when it is claimed to be quite a luxury. 



The Vallisneria spirahs, a plant that abounds in 

 the rivers of Southern Europe, deserves a men- 

 tion here on account of the strange action of the 

 flowers at the time of inflorescence. The pistillate 

 or female flower first appears at the surface of the 

 water in which it grows ; there it floats as if in ex- 

 pectation of a companion. Soon the staminate or 

 male flowers borne on long spiral stems begin to 

 rise from the bottom, gradually unrolling their 

 long flower stalks till they also reach the surface. 

 They and the female flowers now float towards 

 each other till they meet and touch ; this contact 

 results in the fertilization of the ovules, and im- 

 mediately they begin to sink again beneath the 

 water, there to perfect and ripen their seeds in 

 safety. 



The Melon tree — Carica Papaya — a native of 

 South America, is of interest both for its manner 

 of growth and its usefulness to man. It is a rapidly 

 growing tree, attaining in its fourth year a height 

 of twenty feet ; it then enjoys a short maturity and 

 then dies. From its quick growth, broad, um- 

 brella-like shade and rapid decay some have seen 

 in this or some near relative the melon tree of the 

 Prophet Jonah. From the time it attains the 

 height of six feet it produces at all seasons flowers 

 and both green and ripe fruit. The fruit grows 

 around the base of the tree crown as do the nuts 

 of the cocoa palm. When mature it is of a yellow 

 color and has the appearance of befonging to the [ 

 cucumber family. The fruit grows to a weight of 

 fifteen pounds, is shaped like a melon, and is 

 striped longitudinally like that fruit. Both the 

 green and ripe fruit are used for food ; the former 

 as pickles and the latter with salt and pepper or 

 sugar. The seeds have a strong flavor, and are 

 used as a spice. The leaves are used as a sub- 

 stitute for soap, for which it answers the purpose 

 well. They are also used to wrap around tough 

 and stringy meat, which it renders tender and 

 palatable in a short time. The tree is of easy cul- 

 ture, and is extensively raised in tropical parts of 

 both America and Africa. It requires but little 

 care, and produces ripe fruit before it is a year 

 old. 



The Mahwa tree — Bassia latifoha — is a product 

 of the Manghyr district, India, and is much re- 

 sorted to as a source of food for both man and 

 beast. The part eaten is the succulent corolla of 



the flowers. These fall from the trees in great 

 abundance during the early spring. This is a 

 season of general feasting among the lower ani- 

 mals as well as man. Birds, squirrels and other 

 small animals crowd to the feast during the day, 

 and near night jungle fowls and peacocks come 

 out and dispute their possession with the deer and 

 the bear. As a wholesome, nutritious food the 

 Mahwa flowers possess superior merit. As an ar- 

 ticle for feeding- stock this seems to excel in cheap- 

 ness; abundance, the supply being unlimited ; cer- 

 tain yield, the supply having never been known 

 to fail ; nourishing qualities ; and good keeping 

 qualities. 



But the list of these interesting vegetable pro- 

 ductions grows, and we see no termination, so we 

 may as well take our leave of them at this point 

 and leave a long list to be noticed some other 

 time or — never. 



EDITORIAL NOTES. 



Medinilla Curtisii. — Those who love beauti- 

 ful plants, and to watch them in their behaviour 

 through all their various forms, always have a 

 rich treat in the natural order, Melastomaceae, to 

 which this beautiful novelty belongs. They are 

 remarkable as being of little service to man, 

 although there are well on to a thousand species 

 known to and named and described by botan. 

 ists ; though perhaps this lack of utility comes 

 from their chief home being among people who 

 are satisfied to know little, and whose chief boast 

 is that they live in climates where about all they 

 have to do in order to live is to lie under palm 

 trees, and eat what falls around them. They want 

 little, hence have little inducement to discover 

 how these plants may minister to human wants of 

 which they know nothing. The plants are wholly 

 tropical or sub-tropical, less than a dozen pene- 

 trating the territory of the United States, of which 

 the very pretty Deer Grass, or Meadow Beauty, 

 Rhexia Virginica is a familiar example. Perhaps 

 there might be valuable dye-plants among them. 

 Some of them have succulent berrj'-Iike plants 

 among them, and one of them so stains the mouth 

 on eating, that the fact has given the name to the 

 genus from which the whole order has been 

 named — Melastoma; that is Greek for "black 

 mouth." But if, as the poet says, "Beauty is its 

 own excuse for being," these plants are abundantly 

 useful, for some of our most charming conserva- 

 tory plants are from among this order. They are 



