THE PLANTAIN AND BANANA. 



455 



making ; its juice is used as caustic for wounds, and its thorns serve 

 the Indians for needles and pins. 



The Bromelias are widely diffused throughout the tropics, growing 

 everywhere in all varieties of soil. The plant is extensively used for 

 hedges, for which its strong, straight, and spiny leaves admirably 

 adapt it, and may be cultivated with a minimum of labour and cost, 

 and in unlimited quantities. It is closely allied to the pine-apple, 

 but the fruit is different, the ovaries failing to combine in one mass, 

 as in the case of the pine-apple, the formation of which they well 

 illustrate. 



The wild pine-apple grows in abundance at Gaboon, Grand Bassam, 

 Assinee, Porto Novo, Liberia, and other parts of the West Coast of 

 Africa. It is employed for making nets, hammocks, superior cordage, 

 and fabrics. 



THE PLANTAIN AND BANANA. 



Among the splendid, varied, and profuse vegetation, with which 

 tropical countries abound in so infinite a degree, the magnificent, her- 

 baceous plant, the Plantain, usually attracts particular notice ; and, 

 together with the cocoa and other palms, are the productions of the 

 vegetable kingdom, which adorn the picture of the artist when de- 

 picting the scenery of the tropics. The broad leaves overhang grace- 

 fully the succulent huge stem of the plant ; whilst just at their bases, 

 huge clusters of fruit, of yellow, red, and other colours, contrast har- 

 moniously with their shining, dark green foliage. 



The size this splendid plant usually attains is 8 feet, but I have 

 seen them reach an elevation of 12 and even 15 feet, with a diameter 

 of stalk from 1 foot to 2 feet. 



The plants of the Musa tribe, though they cannot, like the palms, 

 be called the princes of the vegetable kingdom, rank first in the series 

 of endogenous plants, and are without exception the grandest of the 

 herbaceous vegetables, whether their gigantic size, the breadth and 

 beauty of their foliage, the abundance and quality of their fruit, or the 

 surpassing grandeur of their flowers, be considered. They are devoid 

 of true stems, but form a spurious stem, often of considerable thick- 

 ness, from the leaves as they rise from the root stocks, being sheathing 

 at their base, encircling each other, and enveloping layer within layer 

 the slender flower and fruit stalk. They are not confined to the 

 tropics, but approach in many parts towards the cooler latitudes of 

 either hemisphere. The plantain may be seen laden with its enor- 

 mous masses of wholesome pleasant food in the mild climate of 

 Madeira ; but its yield of fruit is dependent on, and varies with, the 

 temperature of the climate in which it is grown. In this respect it is 

 a striking instance of the increasing bounteousness of nature as we 

 recede from the poles and approach the Equator, and is a mani- 

 festation of the beneficence of the Creator. 



The plantain is universal. It is as the Penates — the household god 

 of the labourer's cottage. It grows everywhere on the mountain sides, 

 and might be cultivated to any extent. Hitherto its value has been 



