282 THE NUT CULTURIST. 



their common South American name. These nuts are 

 more frequently seen in European seaports than in those 

 of this country. 



South Sea chestnut. — See Tahitian chestnut. 

 Tahitian chestnut. — The seeds of a tree known 

 in the South Sea islands by the native name of Toi, but 

 to botanists as Inocarpus edulis. It belongs to the bean 

 family {Leguminosm). The tree grows sixty to eighty 

 feet high, and when young the stems are fluted like a 

 Grecian column, but as they increase with age the pro- 

 jections extend outward, until they form a kind of but- 

 tress all around the lower part, gradually decreasing 

 upward. This so-called chestnut tree has yellow flowers, 

 succeeded by flbrous pods containing one large seed or 

 nut, which, when roasted or boiled, resembles the chest- 

 nut in taste. The nuts have a different local name in 

 almost every one of the Pacific islands where it is at all 

 iabundant. 



Tavola nut. — See Myrobalan nut. 

 Tallow nut. — A local and nearly obsolete name 

 for the fruit of the Ogeechee lime or sour gum tree 

 {Nyssa capitata) of the swamps of Florida, Georgia and 

 Westward. The fruit is about an inch long, resembling 

 a small plum, the pulp having an agreeable acid taste. 

 Bertram, p. 94, refers to this fruit under the name of 

 " Tallow nut," but why so called is not explained. 



Tallow nut. — The fruit of the Chinese Tallow 

 tree, StilUngia sebifera, of the spurgewort family 

 {EuphorhiacecB), a native of China, where it is, as well 

 as in some of the warmer parts of America, extensively 

 cultivated. It. has been planted in a few localities in 

 the Southern States, and appears to thrive. It is a 

 small tree thirty to forty feet high, with rhomboid 

 tapering leaves and a three-celled capsuled fruit, each 

 cell containing only a single seed thickly coated with a 

 yellow, tallow-like substance, hence its common name. 



