174 OUR COMMON FRTJITS. 



received this title in consequence of its being eatable 

 throughout like an apple, the skin being soft and melting 

 as the flesh of a peach ; and the latest novelty with which 

 the family has presented us, the miniature Tangerine 

 Orange, often not more than an inch in diameter, and which 

 has been too recently introduced to have been included in 

 Eisso's list, is also eaten entire; its peculiar perfume 

 pervading the whole fruit, and rendering the rind almost 

 as agreeable as the pulp. Though so small, it is far more 

 expensive in England than its larger brethren (owing to 

 the limited supply furnished from Tangiers) , being com- 

 monly sold in Covent Garden at 2s. the dozen. But 

 however strange the form assumed by some of the sweet 

 oranges, yet greater singularities are met with when we 

 come to the tribe of Bigaradiers, our bitter or Seville 

 Oranges. Trees of this kind are generally less tall than 

 those which bear sweet fruit, the foliage is thicker, and 

 the leaf-stalks have larger wings, while the flower is larger 

 and more odorous, and therefore preferred for the purposes 

 of the perfumer. The fruit has a more rugged rind and 

 a redder colour when ripe, every part of the tree, in fact, 

 being on a sort of stronger scale " an orange pushed to 

 excess," as Kisso expresses it. Among the varieties of 

 the Bigaradier are to be found some which are " horned," 

 others which look as though two or three smaller fruits, 

 more or less formed, were growing out of the summit of 

 the larger one ; another, the Bicolor* the leaves of which 

 are variegated with patches of white, while the fruit is 

 marked with coloured stripes, first green, then red, and 

 having the further peculiarity that the vesicles of essen- 

 tial oil upon those stripes are concave, while on the other 

 part of the fruit they are convex. The Bigaradier violette 

 has some of its leaves and some of its flowers of a rich 

 violet hue, the others being of the ordinary colour, the 

 flowers, which grow from the axil of a green leaf, being 

 white, while those which spring from the base of a violet 

 one are violet also. The fruit, too, which proceed from 

 the latter, partake of this tint, until they have nearly 



* See Plate "V. fig. 11. 



