BOTANY. 369 



While unripe, its surface is green, its texture firm, and 

 a viscid milky fluid exudes from its rind, both spon- 

 taneously and by incision. When ripe it is soft, and 

 has a pale-yellow colour. The interior of the fruit is a 

 white farinaceous pulp, having in its centre a cellular 

 receptacle, or " core," from whence there radiate nu- 

 merous oblong abortive seeds, each crowned with a 

 long hair or pilus. 



At all the Polynesian islands we visited, the Bread- 

 fruit Tree produces none but abortive seeds ; hence it 

 can only be propagated by solens, or " suckers,' 3 sent 

 off from its roots the mere act of removing the soil 

 from a portion of root, being sufficient to produce a 

 scion, or off-set, from the part thus exposed. It affects 

 rich, moist and sheltered soils, and avoids extreme 

 elevations. The islanders who depend upon its fruit 

 for their subsistence, plant the tree around their dwell- 

 ings, but obtain their chief supply from more interior 

 lands, where the species abounds in a wild or partly- 

 neglected state. The several varieties have different 

 seasons for bearing their fruit ; consequently there is a 

 greater or less supply of this valuable esculent during 

 the entire year : the intervals of comparative scarcity, 

 or a bad general crop being provided against, by the fruit 

 being kept in a state of acetous fermentation, or as it 

 is prepared by the Tahitians under the name of mahi or 

 tio'o. 



It is only when the fruit has attained its full growth 

 but is yet unripe that it is generally used as food. 

 When it is cooked by roasting, in the Polynesian man- 

 ner, and the charred rind removed, the pulp within is 

 perfectly white, has a soft and elastic consistence, and 

 a bland agreeable taste. Like our bread, potatoe, and 

 other farinaceous foods, man can subsist upon it for an 



VOL. II. 2 B 



