160 ORANGE CULTURE IN FLORIDA. 



the desire to steal from nature the perfumes of 

 flowers and aroma of fruits. 



It is then not surprising that we are indebted to 

 them for the acclimatization of the orange and 

 lemon trees in Syria, Africa, and some European 

 islands. It is certain that the orange was known to 

 their physicians from the commencement of the 

 fourth century of the Hegira. The Damascene has 

 given in his Antidotary the recipe for making oil 

 with oranges, and their seeds (oleum de dtrangula, et 

 oleum de citrangulorum seminibus. Mat. Silv. , f. 58), 

 and Avicenna, who died in 428 of the. Hegira 

 (1050), has added the juice of the bigarade to his 

 syrup of alkedere et sued acetositatus citri (otrodj), et 

 sued acetositatis dlranguli (narendg)." These two 

 Arabians seem to have first employed it in medicine. 



I have examined with care the authors of this 

 nation who preceded these, and find in no other the 

 least hint relating to these species. Mesue, even, 

 who speaks of the citron, says not a word of orange 

 or lemon. I have observed, on the contrary, that 

 Avicenna, in giving his recipe for making syrup of 

 alkedere, in which he puts juice of the bigarade, 

 announces it as a composition of his own invention. 

 This circumstance would indicate that this fruit had 

 been known but a short time in Persia, but it 

 suffices that it was cultivated there to prove that it 

 might, at once, pass into Irak (probably Irak- 

 Arabee, in Asiatic Turkey, comprising Bagdad), 

 and into Syria. 



