152 



POPULAR SCTEISTCE ^t-^WS. 



[OcTOBEK, 1889. 



care and experience are required to produce tlie best 

 results. When the sweating has proceeded far 

 enough, the seeds are dried in the sun hv daily 

 exposure for two or three weeks, hv which time 

 they should assume a rich red tint. Thej may now- 

 he stored or transported. To prepare them for use, 

 the seeds are roasted, \\ke coftee, and, the seed-coats 

 being removed, the kernels ("cocoa-nibs" of com- 

 merce) are ground by heated rollers, which softens 

 the oily matter and reduces the whole to a pasty 

 mass. Chocolate is made by adding sugar and 

 starch to this mass, and flavoring it with vanilla 

 and spices. 



From Prescott's description* of clioinlntl it would 

 appear that this favorite beverage of the Aztecs dif- 

 fered considerably from our modern chocolate. It 

 was made of cacao, flavored with vanilla and spices, 

 but he says "they had a way of preparing the froth 

 so as to make it about solid enough to be eaten, and 

 took it cold." At another placet he says: "The 

 Emperor [Montezuma] took no other beverage than 

 chocolatl, a potation of chocolate, flavored with 

 vanilla and other spices, and so prepared as to be 

 reduced to a froth of the consistency of honey, 

 which gradually dissolved in the mouth. The bev- 

 erage, if so it could be called, was served in golden 

 goblets, with spoons of the same metal or of tortoise- 

 shell, finely wrought. The Emperor was exceed- 

 ingly fond of it, to judge from the quantity — no less 

 than fifty jars or pitchers ! — prepared for his own 

 daily consumption. Two thousand more were 

 allowed for that of his household." In the royal 

 account book of another Aztec Emperor, Nezahaul- 

 coyotl by name, there appears among the items 

 2,744,000 fanegas of cacao (the fanega being equal 

 to about one hundred pounds) as the amount for 

 one year required in his household. 



This would surely prove that the Aztecs had an 

 extraordinary love for cacao, but what is perhaps 

 more curious is that they held the seeds so precious 

 as to use them for money. "The trafiic was carried 

 on partly by barter, and partly by means of a regu- 

 lated currency of different values. This consisted 

 of transparent quills of gold-du.'ft, of hits of tin cut 

 in the form of a T, and of bags of cacao containing 

 a specified number of grains."! 



We learn from Humboldt that the early travellers 

 who visited America were not all favorably im- 

 pressed by the Mexican beverage. Benzoni, who 

 wrote in i^T2, speaks of it as a drink "fitter for 

 hogs than for men." Acosta, one of the Jesuits, .says 

 that "the Spaniards who inhabit America are fond 

 of chocolate to excess ; but that it requires to be 

 accustomed to that black beverage not to be dis- 

 gusted at the mere sight of the froth which swims 

 on it like yeast on a fermented liquor." The Span- 

 iards, however, seem mostly to have liked it from 

 the first, and they, as a people, are today the largest 

 consumers. P'ernando Cortez is reported to have 

 been strong in his praises of cacao, not only as an 

 agreeable beverage, but as a nutritious article of 

 food. A companion of Cortez writes: "He who 

 has drunk one cup can travel a whole day without 

 other food, especially in very hot climates ; for 

 chocolate is by its nature cpol and refreshing." 

 Aproposof this statement, llumboldtremarks : "We 

 shall not subscribe to the latter part of this asser- 

 tion ; but we shall soon have occasion in our voyage 

 on the Orinoco, and our excursions toward the sum- 

 mit of the Cordilleras, to celebrate the salutary 

 properties of chocolate. It is easily conveyed and 

 readily employed; as an aliment it contains a large 

 quantity of nutritive and stimulating particles in a 



♦Conquest of Mexico, Vol. I., p. 155. 

 fVoI. II., p. 125. 

 |lbid, Vol. I., p. 145. 



small compass. It has been said witli truth that in 

 the East, rice, gum, and ghee (clarified butter), 

 assist man in crossing the deserts; and so in the 

 New World, chocolate and the flour of maize have 

 rendered accessible to the traveller the table lands 

 of the Andes and vast uninhabited forests."* 



Besides the fat, starch, and other nutritious con- 

 stituents of the seeds which give cacao its impor- 

 tance as a food, the presence of from 1.2 to 1.5 per 

 cent, of an alkaloid known as theobromine (which is 

 really identical with the iheine and caffeine of tea 

 and coffee) makes cacao a gentle stimulant, and to 

 this fact is undoubtedly due in great part its popu- 

 larity. 



The fatty constituent of the seeds, which forms 

 about 45 per cent, of their bulk, is separated by 

 pressure as a sweet-smelling, tallow-like substance, 

 with a melting-point of 114.8"^ Fahr. Its properties 

 are such as to render it a valuable medium for the 

 application of various drugs, and, under the name 

 of "butter of cacao" or "cocoa-butter," it is largely 

 used in the preparation of salves, ointments, and 

 similar medicaments. 



As in cacao the important constituent is the alka- 

 loid theobromine, so in Coca, were it not for the 

 presence of the alkaloid cocaine, the plant would 

 never have been cultivated. The leaves, first used 

 as a masticatory by the natives of South America, 

 l)ecame, after a while, introduced into medicine, 

 and finally, when, a few years ago, it was discovered 

 that the contained alkaloid yielded a local ana'sthe- 

 tic, it was realized that the world had found in coca 

 a drug of the highest importance. So much has 

 been written of late, however, about cocaine and 

 coca, that for our present purpose a very brief 

 account will be sufficient. 



The inhabitants of the Andean region of South 

 America, where the plant is indigenous, call it cuca 

 or coca. The latter form has come to be the one 

 most widely adopted, and was incorporated in the 

 botanical name, Erythroxyloii coca, given to it by 

 Lamark in the early part of this century. The 

 generic name (from the Greek erythros, red, and 

 xylon, wood) refers to the fact that certain species 

 have a bright red wood, which is somewhat used in 

 dyeing. In the coca family {Krythroxylacece) there 

 is no other genus, and coca is the only well-known 

 species. Its nearest relatives among our common 

 plants are the maples and horse-chestnuts. 



The coca-plant is a shrub, growing but little taller 

 than a man, and bearing numerous dark green 

 leaves. These (the only part used) are somewhat 

 like tea-leaves, but with a smooth edge and three 

 prominent longitudinal veins. 



Like tea-leaves, the leaves of coca are prepared 

 for use by drying. Three times a year a crop is 

 harvested. Only the mature leaves are taken, the 

 picking being done by hand, and the greatest care 

 exercised not to bruise the tender shoots. As fast 

 as gathered, the leaves are brought to the place of 

 drying, which is usually' a walled enclosure, evenly 

 paved with flat stones, exposed to the sun and kept 

 very clean. When the stones have become well 

 heated the leaves are strewn on them in a thin 

 layer, and, as soon as dry, they are packed in bales 

 ready for transportation. Especial precautions are 

 necessary to keep the leaves from all moisture, as 

 when damp they very quickly spoil. 



The use of coca as a stimulant is undoubtedly 

 very ancient, for among the aborigines of South 

 America the habit of coca-chewing was in full force 

 at the time of the Spanish conquest. Regarding 

 the plant as a divine gift, the ancient Peruvians 

 employed it as an offering to the siui, or to produce 



♦Travels, Vol. II,, p. 59. 



smoke at the great sacrifice, and the priests, it was 

 believed, must chew the leaves during the perform- 

 ance of their religious rites, or the gods would not 

 be propitiated. The people spoke of it as "that 

 heavenl3' plant which satisfies the hungry, strength- 

 ens the weak, and makes men forget their 

 troubles." 



The Peruvian Indian of today is always provided 

 with a pouch of coca, and a little gourd filled with 

 powdered unslacked lime or alkaline ashes. Three 

 or four times a day, whatever the occupation, work 

 is suspended, and the laborer resigns himself to the 

 delights of coca-chewing. A small handful of the 

 leaves is taken and chewed to a pulp; this is formed 

 into a ball, and a small quantity of the alkali 

 applied with a splinter of wood. The mass has 

 now acquired a pungent taste, and excites salivation 

 for about an hour. Two or three ounces of leaves a 

 day is an average allowance for one Indian. It is 

 estimated that 40.000,000 pounds of dried coca- 

 leaves are annually consumed, about 10,000,000 of 

 the human race habitually using the leaves in the 

 manner described. 



The effects produced are described as a sense of 

 general well-being and contentment, and a most 

 remarkable power of prolonged or severe exertion, 

 without hunger or apparent fatigue. Travellers 

 have found, also, that it prevents the hemorrhages 

 that are apt to occur in the elevated passes of the 

 Andes, some of which are at an altitude of 17,000 

 feet. While the moderate habitual use does not 

 seem to he any more harmful than the moderate 

 use of tobacco or tea, the habit is said to grow upon 

 a person, and finally the inveterate, excessive coca- 

 chewer exhibits symptoms of a shattered constitu- 

 tion quite as bad as those of the confirmed drunkard. 



«♦» 



HORTICULTURAL HINTS. 



Miniature Treks.— The dwarf trees which the 

 Japanese horticulturists are showing at the Paris 

 Exhibition are attracting much attention. Pines, 

 thujas, and cedars, said to be 100 or 150 years old, 

 are only eighteen inches high, and with such speci- 

 mens, as Garden and Forest says, it would be easy 

 to have a coniferous forest on a balcony. These 

 arboreal deformities are produced by great labor, 

 and, if the truth is told about their ages, this work 

 of arresting the tree's development and forcing it 

 into contorted forms must be persisted in by several 

 generations of foresters. All this painstaking is 

 hardly paid for by the beauty of the resulting abor- 

 tions, but, as has been suggested, a look at these 

 trees will explain where the fantastic forms come 

 from which serve as models for the plants we see on 

 the lacquered trays, bronzes, and embroideries which 

 come from Japan. 



Natural Scent of Flowers. — The modest- 

 looking mignonette flower, as is well known, is one 

 of the most deliciously fragrant, with a fragrance of 

 that class that is not overpowering, and that few can 

 be found to object to. The same is true of the sweet 

 briar, lemon-verbena and its class. With the old 

 white lily, lily of the valley, and Cape Jasmine, this 

 is not so. Too much of either of these easily be- 

 comes nauseating, and, in some cases, causes sick- 

 ness; but the former class, probably rarely. It may 

 not be known of the three former that the fragrance 

 is so persistent and continuous, that a sprig plucked 

 and put in the pocket with a handkerchief, or among 

 the clothes, like the lavender of our grandmother's 

 days, will leave a pleasant fragrance behind for 

 many days. The next time you pass a bed of 

 mignonette, try it. Pluck half a dozen heads and 

 put in the pocket below the handkerchief, and, our 

 word for it, the delightful .scent will be there for 

 some time. 



