56 FLORIDA: ITS CLIMATE, SOIL, PRODUCTIONS, 



have been immersed therein and that the vapor of the tree serves the 

 same purpose, it being a common custom with the inhabitants to sus- 

 pend joints of meat, poultry, &c., in the upper branches of the trees to 

 soften and prepare them for cooking. 



Thompson, in his System of Chemistry, makes an extract from a 

 French work on chemistry, entitled Annales de Chimie, which states 

 that 



Fibrine had been previously supposed to belong exclusively to the animal kingdom 

 but this tree had been found to contain this substance. 



The papaw tree is a perpetual bearer of fruits and flowers, or blossoms, 

 and yields enormous quantities of fruit, a single tree supplying enough 

 for a large family. 



Custard apple (Anona reticulata) is sometimes called sugar apple. 

 There are upwards of forty varieties of this fruit, and nearly all the 

 species are edible. Almost every tropical country lays claim to its 

 own favorite variety. In Peru it is greatly esteemed, and considered 

 not inferior to any other fruit in the world. The species derives its 

 English name (custard apple) from the consistence of the pulp of tin 

 fruit; and its rich color, fragrant odor, and handsome appearance are 

 well characterized in the expression, "apples of gold in pictures of 

 silver." 



The Spanish-American cherimoyer (Anona cherimoUa), and the West 

 India soursop (Anona muricata), sweetsop (Anona squamosa), and alli- 

 gator apple (Anona palustris) are of this genus. This delicious fruit is 

 produced in excellent perfection as far north as Saint Augustine, and 

 is easily propagated from seed. 



FIGS. 



Pigs are easily raised from cuttings, and begin to bear in two years, 

 producing one good and one or two additional but inferior crops annu- 

 ally. Two hundred tree s may be set at nominal cost on an acre. T-U43 

 remarkable vigor and thrift attending the growth of the tig in this 

 State, and the many facilities afforded for an unlimited business grow- 

 ing out of its cultivation and preparation for market, are so decided, 

 that this fruit is worthy, like the orange and cane, of special attention 

 here. A simple preparation of figs by boiling in sirup will furnish a 

 most palatable and wholesome preserve, that only needs to be known 

 to become a universal favorite; and if figs can be prepared for a lucra- 

 tive market, by drying, anywhere on earth, it can be done in Florida. 

 The London Encyclopedia mentions fifty-six species, of which the follow- 

 ing are the most remarkable: 



F. cerica, the common fig tree with an upright stem branching fifteen or twenty 

 feet high, and garnished with large palinated or hand-shaped leaves. Of this there 

 are many varieties, asthe common fig tree, with large, oblong, dark purplish bine fruit, 

 which ripens in August either on standards or w T alls, and of which it carries a great 

 quantity; the brown or chestnut fig, a large, globular, chestnut -colored fruit hav- 



