OF THE PINE APPLE. 3 



from fifteen to eighteen months after planting the 

 crown. The common weight of the fruit is from 

 half a pound to three pounds ; and it abounds 

 chiefly in the dry season. In the rainy sea- 

 son, which includes nearly half the year, ripe Pine 

 Apples are more scarce in the gardens of Jamaica 

 than in the hot-houses of England. 



In the neighbourhood of Calcutta it is culti- 

 vated in the same manner as in Jamaica, and, when 

 liberally supplied with water, by a system of sur- 

 face-irrigation, the first is said to attain a large size, 

 and to be in season most months of the year. 



The first attempts to cultivate the Pine Apple 

 in Europe seem to have been made about the end 

 of the seventeenth century, by M. Le Cour (or 

 La Court, as written by Collinson), a wealthy 

 Flemish merchant, who had a fine garden at Drie- 

 oeck, near Ley den. Of this garden he published 

 an account in 1732, and died in 1737. 



It was visited by Miller and Justice, who speak 

 of its proprietor as one of the greatest encouragers 

 of gardening in his time ; of having curious walls 

 and hot-houses ; and as being the first person who 

 succeeded in cultivating the Pine Apple. It was 

 from him, Miller observes, (Dictionary, Art. Bro- 

 melia,) that our gardens were first supplied, through 

 Sir Matthew Decker, of Richmond, in the year 1719 ; 

 though, as a botanic plant, it had been introduced 

 so far back as 1690, by Mr. Bentick, afterwards 

 Earl of Portsmouth. 



