THE CACAO-TREE. 183 



which the Indians prepared from its beans so agreeable that 

 they reckoned it among the most pleasing fruits of their con- 

 quest, and lost no time in making their European friends 

 acquainted with its use. P>om Mexico they transplanted it 

 into their other dependencies, so that in America its present 

 range of cultivation extends from 20° N. lat. to Gruayaquil and 

 Bahia. It has even been introduced into Africa and Asia, in 

 return for the many useful trees that have been imported from 

 the Old into the New World. The cacao-tree seldom rises above 

 the height of twenty feet ; its leaves are large, oblong, and 

 pointed. The flowers, which are of a pale red colour, grow on 

 the stem and larger branches, and spring even from the roots. 

 ' Never,' says Humboldt, ' shall I forget the deep impression 

 made upon me by the luxuriance of tropical vegetation on first, 

 seeing a cacao-plantation. After a damp night, large blossoms 

 of the theobroma issue from the root at a considerable distance 

 from the trunk, emerging from the deep black mould. A 

 more striking example of the expansive powers of life can 

 hardly be met with in organic nature.' The fruits are large, 

 oval, pointed pods, about five or six inches long, and containing 

 in five compartments from twenty to forty beans. 



The trees ure raised from seed, generally in places screened 

 from the wind. As they are incapable of bearing the scorching 

 rays of the sun, particularly when young, bananas, maize, 

 manioc, and other broad-leaved plants are sown between their 

 rows, under whose shade they enjoy the damp and sultry heat 

 which is indispensable to their growth, for the Theobroma Cacao 

 is essentially tropical, and requires a warmer climate than the 

 coffee-tree or the sugar-cane. 



Two years after having been sown, the plant attains a height 

 of three feet, and sends forth many branches, of which however 

 but four or five are allowed to remain. The first fruits appear 

 in the third year, but the tree does not come into full bearing 

 before it is six or seven years old, and from that time forward 

 it continues to yield abundant crops of beans during more than 

 twenty years. When an Indian can get a few thousand cacao- 

 trees planted, he passes an idle, quiet, contented life ; all he has 

 to do is to weed under the trees two or three times in the year, 

 and to gather and dry the seeds in the sun. 



Cacao is chiefly used under the form of chocolate. The 



