I4 8 FLOWER-LAND. 



III. Succulent fruits (generally indehiscenf). 



(i) The drupe* is a simple or syncarpous (com- 

 pound) fruit, with a fleshy mesocarp, and hard or 

 stony endocarp. You know it well, and perhaps it 

 is one of your favourite fruits, as it includes the plum, 

 the cherry (Fig. 120), the peach, the apricot, and 

 other kinds of stone fruit, as they are often called. 

 d 



Here you must notice some 

 drupaceous apocarpous (com- 

 pound) fruits, such as the black- 

 berry and the raspberry : each 

 ripened ovary or fruitlet being 

 Fi g- 133- Drupaceous called a drupel or little drupe 



Fruit of Blackberry. /T ^. ... 



</, drupels. (FlgS. I33 22 P- 26 )- 



So also the drupaceous, but syncarpous walnut. 

 Get the whole fruit, if possible, fresh off the tree, 

 and take the hard endocarp, with the seed 

 inside it, out of its green case, that is, the fleshy 

 mesocarp, with its thin skin or epicarp. Only 

 be careful, if you do not want to stain your fingers; 

 and if you taste the mesocarp, you will not, I think, 

 be inclined to taste it again ; unless, indeed, you 

 enjoy the whole fruit epicarp, mesocarp, endocarp, 

 and seed, pickled when young or tender pickled 

 walnuts. | 



* From the Latin " drupcz" (from the Greek " drys," a tree, and 

 *' pipto" I fall), ripe olives, ready to fall off. 



f Compare the drupaceous walnuts with the nuts of the hazel or 

 beech (p. 147). 



