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turesque appearance, those fine plantations of 

 date-trees, near Elche, in Murcia, where in one 

 square league are found upwards of 70,000 

 palms. The cocoa-tree bears fruit in abundance 

 till it is thirty or forty years old ; after this age, 

 the produce diminishes, and a trunk a hundred 

 years old, without being altogether barren, 

 yields very little produce* In the town of Cu- 

 mana a great quantity of oil of cocoas is made, 

 which is limpid, without smell, and very fit 

 for burning. The trade in this oil is not less 

 brisk than that on the coast of Africa for palm 

 oil, which is obtained from the elays guineensis, 

 and is used as food. At Cumana I have often 

 witnessed the arrival of canoes laden with 3000 

 cocoa-nuts. A tree in full bearing yields an 

 annual revenue of two piastres and half (eleven 

 shillings and tenpence halfpenny). But in the 

 haciendas of cocoa, trees of different ages being 

 mixed, the capital * is estimated by appraisers 

 only at four piastres. 



* These valuations may serve to throw some light on the 

 advantages derived from the culture of fruit -trees under the 

 torrid zone. Near Cumana, a banana is valued by estima- 

 tion at one realdeplata (6|c?.). A nispero, or sapota, at 10 

 piastres. Four cocoa-nuts, or eight fruits of the nispero 

 (achras sapota), are sold for half a real. The price of the 

 former has doubled within these twenty years, on account 

 of the great exportation that has been made to the islands. 

 A good bearing nispero yields the farmer, who can sell the 



