34O THE BOOK OF USEFUL PLANTS 



shade, and abundant food -for the traveller. The 

 desert of Sahara would not have been threaded 

 by highways of oriental commerce in the past 

 centuries except that date palms grew at the 

 scattered oases, and furnished cheer for the weary 

 caravans. 



We can understand the jealous feeling that led 

 the crafty Arabs of Asia Minor and Tunis to cheat 

 the clever and energetic American horticulturists 

 with seeds of inferior seedling varieties when the 

 effort was first made to establish date culture in 

 the hot regions of this country. The date palm 

 does not come true from seed, and of seedling 

 trees, but one in a great host can be expected to be 

 a fruit of any merit. So progress has been slow, 

 and discouragements many in the few spots 

 adapted to successful date culture in America. 

 At last suckers of good varieties have been 

 obtained from dependable sources in the best 

 date-growing regions of North Africa and Arabia, 

 and we are at last getting home-grown dates from 

 trees in the torrid Imperial Valley of southern 

 California, from Yuma, Arizona, and other points, 

 where the work of the Government Plant Intro- 

 duction Bureau was first successful. 



One thing the Arabs discovered long ago: the 

 staminate, or male trees, are barren, and the 



