THE CABBAGE PALMETTO. 17 



or other appendage save a loose, globular crown of 

 large palmated leaves, it is one of the most beauti- 

 ful and majestic members of our southern flora. The 

 leaves, when fully expanded, are of a brilliant green 

 with petioles two feet or more in length and palmate 

 blades varying from three to five feet in breadth. 

 They are so arranged that the smallest occupy the 

 center of the summit and the largest the circumfer- 

 ence. The stem increases in height only by the 

 growth of the terminal bud, and before the leaves de- 

 velop they are folded like a fan. As the older leaves 

 die and drop away, the bases of their petioles and 

 their sheaths form a protuberance about the base of 

 the crown; the sheaths in time being dissolved into a 

 network of brown interlaced fibers. 



In the words of Michaux, the base of the unopened 

 bundle of leaves "is white, compact and tender ; it is 

 eaten with oil and vinegar, and resembles the arti- 

 choke and the cabbage in taste, whence is derived the 

 name of 'cabbage tree.' But to destroy a vegetable 

 which has been a century in growing, to obtain three 

 or four ounces of a substance neither richly nutri- 

 tious nor peculiarly agreeable to the palate, would be 

 pardonable only in a desert which was destined to 

 remain uninhabited for ages. With -similar prodigal- 

 ity of the works of nature, the first settlers of Ken- 

 tucky killed the buffalo, an animal weighing twelve 

 or fifteen hundred pounds, for the pleasure of eat- 



