SAPOTILLA. 
29 
and of a very austere disagreeable taste, like our un- 
ripe Medlar, and hence the Spanish name of Naseberry ; 
but when ripe it is reddish-brown without, bright yellow 
within, well scented, of a very delicious taste, and quite 
refreshing. Jacquin even preferred it to the Pine-apple. 
Like all cultivated fruits, the Sapotilla is subject to a 
variety of forms, some being oblong and ovoid, pear- 
shaped or round, others with the summit pointed and the 
base enlarged. According to Tussac, there is scarcely any 
fruit in the West Indies more esteemed, and it is there 
carefully cultivated. 
In Jamaica, the Naseberry Bully Tree is one of the 
largest in the mountain forest, growing 40 or 50 feet high, 
with a trunk as large as an oak, and is esteemed as one of 
the best and strongest timber trees in the island. It bears 
a round fruit about the bulk of a nutmeg, rough externally 
like a Russetting apple, and of the same colour. 
The summit of the Florida Sapotilla is spreading, and 
the branches covered with a light gray bark. The leaves 
are clustered towards the summits of the twigs, and are 
about 2 inches long by an inch wide, elliptic, obtuse at 
each end, and often emarginate, with ferruginously pubes- 
cent petioles an inch in length. The peduncles are about 
the same length, or a little longer, drooping, and aggre- 
gated by 2 or 3 together in the axils of the leaves. The 
calyx is brown, silky, and always closed, with 3 of the seg- 
ments external. The corolla is cream-coloured and of the 
same length with the calyx. 
The bark of the Sapota is very astringent and febrifugal, 
and was once supposed to be the true Jesuit’s bark. The 
seeds of this plant are powerfully aperient and diuretic. 
The resin also which its milky Sap affords, is possessed 
of medical properties, and when burnt diffuses an odor of 
incense. 
There appear to be two varieties of this tree at Key 
Vol.ui. — 5 
