534 



THE PA PA IV. 



growing for its shapely form and ample, abundant and 

 fine foliage, as well as for its fruit. But it should 

 have a sheltered place in northern gardens, and good 



ground always. It grows well with us on Long Island, 

 and the specimen in the Rural Grounds, which I have 

 seen, is a handsome, broad-headed bush-tree with a splen- 

 did growth of leaves and carrying a good deal of fruit. 



' ' The leaves are obovate-lanceolate, nine or ten inches 

 long by three or four inches wide, and light green above 

 and pale on the under side. The flowers, which appear 

 with the leaves in May, are about inch across, 

 greenish, changing with age to brown, and solitary at 

 the leaf joints of the previous year's young wood. The 

 fruit looks like an almost cylindrical, very fleshy Wind- 

 sor bean pod ; it is three to five inches long, oblong, 

 rounded, somewhat falcate, and often misshapen from 



Average Size Leaf and Fruit of Papaw. 



A Cluster of Half-Grown Papaw Fruit. 



the imperfect development of some of its seeds. The 

 unripe fruit is green, but when ripe the flesh is yellow 

 and the skin dark brown ; it is then sweet and luscious 

 to the taste, but it is with the papaw as it is with the 

 persimmon — we cannot reasonably expect as good fruit 

 in the north as may be had in the south. It is an inter- 

 esting tree, and well suited to small grounds or to posi- 

 tions near the dwelling." E. S. Carman. 



