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The World's Commercial Products 



JAVA. DIGGING OUT CANAL TO PROVIDE A PLANTATION WITH WATER 



indicated by the scientific name given to the genus of plants of which it is the most important 

 member. Theobroma was derived by Linnaeus from the Greek words deos (God) and j3po)/xi< 

 (food)—" Food of the Gods." Belonging to the genus Theobroma there are altogether about 

 twelve species, all of which are natives of- tropical America. 



The commercially important cacao (Theobroma Cacao) is a small spreading tree, not 

 usually exceeding- twenty- feet in height, although trees of double this height have been recorded 

 from time to time. The illustrations afford a good idea of its general habit and also show 

 perfectly clearly one of its most characteristic features, namely, the manner in which the 

 flowers and pods are borne. In the trees of temperate climates, and in the majority of those 

 of the tropics, the flowers and fruits arise on young side branches, for example, in apples, 

 pears, oaks, horse chestnuts, and numberless other instances. In some tropical trees, however, 

 this is not the case, but they are carried directly on the main trunk and principal branches. 

 The cacao affords the best instance of this striking peculiarity amongst important economic 

 plants. A little tuft of a dozen or more small, in fact quite insignificant, flowers appear on 

 the trunk, and are succeeded by the pods, which are often eight or ten inches in length. These 

 have a very odd appearance, hanging quite away from any leaves on the thick trunks, 

 as a glance at the picture on page 115 will show. Various reasons have been put forward to 

 account for this strange habit. It has been supposed that extra support was desired, an idea 

 upheld by the fact that many, although not all, of the fruits so borne are large and heavy. 

 Another view, which has a good deal to support it, is that in the dense tropical forests the trunks 

 are more accessible to butterflies and other insects than the massed foliage, and that flowers 

 borne in the comparatively open region of the stems have more chance of being visited and 

 of setting fruit than they would have if they arose in what is, under other circumstances, the 

 normal position. 



De Candolle sums up the question of the native country of this important plant in the 

 following words : ' ; The common cacao (Theobroma Cacao) is a small tree wild in the forests 



