186 CULTURE OF THE WEST INDIAN HONEY-BERRIES AS FRUIT TREES. 
CULTURE OF THE WEST INDIAN HONEY-BERRIES AS FRUIT TREES. 
The common Honey-berry of the West Indies is the fruit of Melicocca bijuga of our 
Botanical Catalogues, and is identical with the M. bijugataoi Jacq. Amer., cviii.,t. 72, and 
the M. carpoidea of Juss. Mem. Mus. iii., p. 187. In the time of Patrick Browne it was 
called the Genip tree, but it is now more generally known as the Honey-berry and Sweet 
Bullace. At Cura^oa the Spaniards call it monos , and cultivate it under that name to a 
great extent. It was introduced to this country in 1778, and is associated by Dr. Lindley, 
in his admirable “Vegetable Kingdom,” with the natural order Sapindacece , or Soap-worts. 
In its native habitats it forms a spreading bush 18 or 20 feet in height. The leaves 
are pinnated; leaflets four, large, and yellowish-green. The rachis winged. Racemes 
terminal and axillary, simple, spike-formed. Flowers octandrous, of four petals, small, 
yellowish-white, the stamineous more yellow than the pistilline ones. Fruit a drupe, one- 
seeded from abortion, growing to the size of a Bullace Plum, to which it bears a considerable 
resemblance, jet black when ripe, sweet, and possessing a very pleasant flavour. 
It grows wild in the Antilles, and New Spain in the province of Caraceas, it is how- 
ever cultivated extensively in the West Indies, Brazil, and other parts of South America. 
The trees are abundant bearers, and the fruit are used for the same purposes as our plums, 
but if eaten in too great quantities, are said to produce salivation, and are therefore used 
in medicine for this purpose. 
The East India Honey-berry, a native of Timor and Ceylon is the produce of a 
different species to that producing in the West Indies, and is called by Botanists, Melicocca 
trijuga, from the circumstances of its leaflets being disposed in three pairs, instead of two 
as in the last. It is the Schleichera triiuga of “ Willd. Spec.,” and Scytalia triiuga of 
“ Roxburgh’s MSS.” 
It forms a small tree 20 feet or more high. Leaves pinnated, leaflets in three pairs, 
oblong, obovate, obtuse. Racemes axillary, elongated. Flowers small, white. Calyx from 
four to six parted. Petals four to six, or from abortion apetalous ; disk occupying the bottom 
of the calyx. Stamens eight, inserted between the margin of the disk and the ovary. 
Style crowned by a two or three lobed stigma. Ovary two or three celled. Fruit round, 
two or three celled, or from abortion one celled. Seeds three, or from abortion, one, 
enwrapped in a fleshy substance. The fruit of this, is when ripe, black and of a pleasant 
flavour. 
The Olive-shaped Honey-berry [Melicocca olivceformis ), is a native of New Grenada, 
and Turbaca. The shrub grows about 16 feet high ; the leaves consist of two pairs of 
large pinnae, which are elliptical, acute, and coriaceous. Rachis naked. Peduncles 
terminal, branched. The fruit grows to the size of an olive, and is of the same shape. 
When ripe it becomes black, and like the other two, is sweet with a pleasant flavour. The 
plant was introduced to Britain in 1818. 
In cultivation, treat exactly in the same manner as the stove species of Flacourtia, and 
there is little doubt but profuse fruitfulness will amply repay the cultivator. Cuttings 
grow planted in pots of sand, and placed under a handglass in a lively heat. 
