BEVERAGE PLANTS 283 



35 cents to 50 cents a day, and boys get from 

 10 cents up! 



The fruits of the coffee plant are at first green, 

 then yellow, then red. At this stage they are. 

 full grown and look just like cherries. These 

 "cherries" are not good to eat, though they are 

 fleshy and red. As they change to dark wine 

 color they are ready to pick. 



The fruit contains two hard little seeds, each 

 flattened on the side that lies next to the other. 

 Each seed has a dry, yellow hull that fits it closely, 

 and a filmy inner lining of this horny "parchment," 

 known in the coffee industry as the "silver skin." 



When one of the beans fails to "fill," the single 

 seed remaining takes up all the room, grows to 

 unusual size, and is not flattened. These seeds are 

 carefully culled out of the company of the flat 

 berries, and sold at a higher price under the trade 

 name, "pea-berries." Another round seed is the 

 berry that grows alone at the tip of each twig. 

 It is smaller than the paired beans, and is sorted 

 out and sold under the trade name, Mocha. 



This name is borrowed from a variety with 

 small grains and very fine flavor, the best Arabian 

 coffee, which never gets into the American market 

 at all. Indeed, all the coffee raised in Arabia is 

 called Mocha, and buyers from Egypt and Tur- 



