168 
FIRST BOOK. 
much work the plant must have done in 
making the large tubers from which we get the 
meal. 
3. I should like to tell you something about 
this work. The cassava plants are reared from 
cuttings^ and they send up their thin, knotty 
stems higher than a tall man. Their leaves are 
large, and are divided into about five narrow 
parts, which meet at the stalk, and spread out 
like fingers. 
4. It is the roots, however, which we think 
most of, for they are storehouses of food. 
It is the plant itself that prepares this food. 
Within its leaves it makes starch out of what it 
takes from the water and the air. Then it sends 
so much of this starch down to its roots that 
they swell out into large tubers. 
5. If we did not disturb the plant, in course of 
time it would draw up for its own use the food 
which it has saved up. W.e, however, are glad 
to take it for ourselves. 
6. There are two kinds of cassava — the bitter, 
and the sweet. The bitter cassava does not become 
soft when boiled, and that is one way by which 
we know it from the sweet kind. Except for 
some tough parts in the centre, the sweet cassava 
gets quite soft if boiled, and may then be eaten 
as a vegetable, like potatoes. 
