NUTMEG-TREE. 127 



observing that 011 the first and second day's exposure they require 

 to be turned very often, and always to be preserved from rain and 

 the evening dews. After this process is completed, which is known 

 by the colour and rattling of the seeds in the berries, they are put 

 up in bags or hogsheads for the market. This spice, which was at 

 first brought over for dietetic uses, has been long employed in the 

 shops as a succedaueum to the more costly oriental aromatics ; " it 

 is moderately warm, of an agreeable flavour, somewhat resembling 

 that of a mixture of cloves, cinnamon, and nutmegs. Distilled 

 with water it yields an elegant essential oil, so ponderous as to 

 sink in the water, in taste moderately pungent, in smell and flavour 

 approaching to oil of cloves, or rather a mixture of cloves and 

 nutmegs. To rectified spirit it imparts, by maceration or digestion, 

 the whole of its virtue: in distillation it gives over very little to this 

 menstruum, nearly all its active matter remaining concentrated in 

 the inspissated extract. 



SECTION XX. 



Mace, or Nutmeg-Tree, 



Myristica Aromatica. Linn. 

 The nutmeg-tree genus has three species, some of which have 

 varieties that by several writers have been regarded as distinct spe- 

 cies, though erroneously. The three we allude to are the following. 



1. Myristica fatua, or wild nutmeg ; this grows in Tobago, and 

 rises to the height of an apple-tree; has oblong, lanceolated, downy 

 leaves, and hairy fruit ; the nutmeg of which is aromatic, but when 

 given inwafdly is narcotic, and occasions drunkenness, delirium, and 

 madness for a time. 



2. The myristica sebifera, a tree frequent in Guiana, rising to 

 forly, or even to sixty feet high; on wounding the trunk of which, 

 a thick, acrid, red juice runs out. Aublet says nothing of the nut- 

 megs being aromatic; he only observes, that a yellow fat is obtained 

 from them, which serves many economical and medical purposes, 

 and that the natives make candles of it. 



3. The myristica aromatica, or nutmeg, attains the height of 

 thirty feet, producing numerous branches, which rise together in 

 stories, and covered with bark, which of the trunk is a reddish 

 brown, but that of the young brauches is of a bright green colour ; 

 the leaves are nearly elliptical, pointed, undulated, obliquely nerved, 



