120 
SECOND BOOK. 
“ Quite true,” replied Mr. Hood. “ Some people 
now deal with their crops in that way, first drying 
the berries well. There are manufacturers in 
London who prefer to have the dry berries, because 
they consider that the coffee then turns out better 
in quality, and they obtain high prices for it.” 
THE BANANA. 
1. The Banana is one of the most beautiful of all 
plants, one of the easiest to cultivate, and one of 
the most productive. In its immense bunches of 
fruit it yields us a rich and abundant supply of food. 
2 . Within the last few years the cultivation of 
this crop has increased very much in Jamaica, 
which is now the centre of the banana trade in the 
West Indies, and exports over five million bunches 
in a year. 
3. Most of these are sent to the United States, 
where, indeed, one kind is generally known as the 
Jamaica Banana, though it bears special names in 
most of the West India Islands, e.g. the Martinique 
variety. 
Nearly half the land that is planted with bananas 
in Jamaica is in the fruitful parish of St. Mary. 
4 . To enable the banana to flourish, it should be 
rooted in a soil that is moist, deep, and loamy, 
with plenty of the decayed parts of plants in it. 
