110 HISTORY OF FRUITS. 



resembles a shower of snow, which nearly obscures the 

 dark green branches. The tree, like the walnut, pro- 

 duces smaller fruit, and better-flavoured, as it becomes 

 older. 



Sonnini, in his Travels in Egypt, says, " If you wish to 

 be supplied with excellent coffee, you must go to Kous, 

 Kenne, or Bonoub ; for when one had arrived at Cairo, or 

 had crossed the Nile, it was no longer pure. Merchants 

 were waiting there to mix it with the common coffee of 

 America. At Alexandria it underwent a second mixture 

 by the factors who forwarded it to Marseilles, where. they 

 did not fail again to adulterate it; so that the pretended 

 Mocha coffee, which is used in France, is often the growth 

 of the American colonies, with about one-third, and seldom 

 with half of the genuine coffee of Yemen. When I was at 

 Kous, the unadulterated coffee of the first quality sold for 

 about ten-pence halfpenny the pound. If to prime cost is 

 added the expense of conveying it to Cairo, the duties 

 which are paid there, the charges for loading and unload- 

 ing, those for transporting it to Alexandria, freight to Mar. 

 seilles, the exorbitant and arbitrary duties with which 

 that commodity is there loaded, and if to these are added 

 commission and the expense of grinding, &c. how is it 

 possible to believe that they should have real Mocha 

 coffee at Paris, at the rate of five shillings per pound ? 



The Turkey coffee is a small berry, and is more esteemed 

 for its flavour than that which grows in the West Indies. 

 We conclude that one great cause of the American coffee 

 being inferior in point of flavour, is owing to the practice, 

 in that part of the world, of gathering the berries before 

 they are quite ripe, whereas the Arabians shake their 

 trees, and by this means obtain the berries in full perfec- 

 tion. Mr. Lunan observes, that the West-Indian berries 

 being considerably larger than those of the Turkey coffee, 

 require much longer keeping; but Mr. Miller, the cele- 



