BIRDS AND ALL NATURE. 



ILLUSTRATED BY COLOR PHOTOGRAPHY. 



Vol. V. 



APRIL, 1899. 



No. 4 



THE NUTMEG. 



( Myristica fragrans Hauthryn. 



DR. ALBERT SCHNEIDER. 

 Northwestern University School of Pharmacy. 



Duni: A gilt nutmeg. 



Biron: A lemon. 



Long: Stuck with cloves. 



— Shakespeare, ^'Love''s Labor Lost,'" V., 2. 



THE nutmeg is the spice obtained 

 from a medium-sized evergreen 

 tree reaching a height of from 

 twenty-five to forty feet. This 

 tree is dioecious, that is the male 

 flowers and the female flowers are 

 borne upon different plants. The 

 male flower consists of a column of 

 from six to ten stamens enclosed by 

 a pale yellow tubular perianth. The 

 female flowers occur singly, in twos 

 or threes, in the axils of the leaves; they 

 also have a pale yellow perianth. The 

 ovary has a single seed which finally 

 matures into the nutmeg and mace. 

 The mature seed is about one and one- 

 fourth inches long and somewhat less in 

 transverse diameter, so that it is some- 

 what oval in outline. It is almost en- 

 tirely enveloped by a fringed scarlet 

 covering known as arillus or arillode 

 ( mace). The entire fruit, nut, mace, 

 and all, is about the size of a walnut 

 and like that nut has a thick outer cov- 

 ering, the pericarp, which is fibrous and 

 attains a thickness of about half an 

 inch. At maturity the pericarp splits 

 in halves from the top to the base or 

 point of attachment. The leaves of 

 the nutmeg tree are simple, entire, and 

 comparatively large. 



The English word nutmeg and the 

 apparently wholly different German 



Muskatnuss, are etymologically similar. 

 The "meg" of nutmeg is said to be de- 

 rived from the old English "muge," 

 which is from the Latin "muscus," mean- 

 ing musk, in reference to the odor. 

 "Muskat" of the German name is also 

 derived from "muscus" and "nuss" means 

 nut, so we have in both instances "musk 

 nut." The arillus was named Miisca- 

 te?ibluome (nutmeg flower) by the early 

 Dutch because of its bright red color. 

 It is generally believed that nutmeg 

 and mace were not used in ancient 

 times. Martins maintains that the 

 word macis mentioned in a comedy by 

 Plautus (260-180 B. C. ) refers to mace. 

 Fliickiger, however, is inclined to be- 

 lieve that this word refers to the bark 

 of some tree of India, as the word is 

 frequently used in that sense by noted 

 writers, as Scribonius, Largus, Dioscori- 

 des, Galenus, Plinius, and others. About 

 800 or 900 A. D., the Arabian physi- 

 cians were familiar with nutmeg and 

 were instrumental in introducing it into 

 western countries. The Europeans first 

 used nutmegs in church ceremonies as 

 incense. Previous to 1200 nutmegs 

 were quite expensive, but soon became 

 cheaper as the plant was more and more 

 extensively cultivated. About 1214 

 they found their way into pharmacy and 

 began to be used among cosmetics. 



