58 LIFE OF A TREE. 
palms are planted in regular order, for the express 
purpose of tapping for their sap. These plan- 
tations go by the name of toddy topes, the exuded 
sap being called toddy. We are told that some 
of these trees, in the hot season, will yield the 
enormous quantity of one hundred pints of sap 
in twenty-four hours. The sugar in this sap soon 
causes it to ferment, and thus supplies the natives 
with an excellent wine; and by distillation a very 
burning sort of spirit called arrack is formed. 
The strange Cactus tribe, with its leathery coat 
of tissue so admirably adapted for the dry and 
parched positions in which it is found, frequently 
supplies the thirsty wanderer with a spring of 
water in a dry and weary land, where no water 
is for miles to be found. By stripping off the 
outer coat of formidable prickles, an abundance | 
of pleasantly-flavoured watery sap is found within ; 
nor can it be doubted that by this peculiar pro- 
vision, which has been called ‘‘ The Spring of the 
Desert,” the life of the exhausted traveller has 
frequently been preserved. Dr. Schleiden tells us 
also that ‘‘ the wild ass of the Llanos knows well 
how to avail himself of these plants. In the 
dry season, when all animals flee from the glow- 
