WAX-TREE. 309 



round it ; which, being very porous, serves to filtrate the minute 

 parts of the tallow, attracted by the burning stick, which by this 

 means is kept alive. 



In like manner the Americans make wax candles of the waxy- 

 berry of the myrica cerifera, or candle-berry myrtle, which burn 

 with a fine clear light, for a long time, and possess a fragrant 

 myrtle odour. 



We are indebted to Dr. Bostock and Mr. Cadet for a very exact 

 account of its properties and extraction. The myrica cerifera is a 

 shrub which grows abundantly in Louisiana, and other parts of 

 North America. It produces a berry about the size of a pepper- 

 corn. A very fertile shrub yields nearly seven pounds. The ber- 

 ries are picked off, thrown into a kettle, and covered with water to 

 the depth of about half a foot. The kettle is then boiled, and the 

 berries stirred and squeezed against the side of the vessel. The 

 wax which they contain is melted out, and swims on the surface. It 

 is skimmed off, passed through a cloth, dried, melted again, and 

 cast into cakes. From the observations of Cadet we learn that the 

 wax forms the outer covering of the berries. The wax thus ob- 

 tained is of a pale green colour. Its specific gravity is 1*0150. It 

 melts at the temperature of 109 ; when strongly heated it burns 

 with a white flame, produces little smoke, and during the combus- 

 tion emits an agreeable aromatic odour. Water does not act upon 

 it. Alcohol, when hot, dissolves ^th of its weight, but lets most of 

 it fall again in cooling. 



There is another species of the myrica, M. gale, found in many 

 of the boggy mosses of our own country, that produces the same 

 material. It is also obtained in South America, as we learn from 

 M. Humboldt, from one or two of the palms, and especially the 

 ceroxylon andicola. 



There are, also, various other insects, besides the bee, that yield 

 either wax, or a material very nearly resembling it ; as the corcus 

 lacca, or gum-lac insect, and perhaps one or two other species of this 

 genus. There is, moreover, another waxy material, collected in a 

 manner somewhat similar, in China, and which is called pela ; well 

 known to be the product of an insect, though the name of the insect 

 is not well known. 



It is probable, as we have observed already, that in all these cases 

 the matter of wax is obtained by the insect from the vegetable king- 



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