COFFEE TREE. 
123 
are doubly compound, with oval-acuminate leaflets from 1 to 2 inches long. 
The leaflets are of a dull green, and in the fall the petiole is of a violet color. 
The Coffee Tree belongs to the class Dîœcia of Linnasus, which includes 
all vegetables whose male and female flowers are borne by different plants; 
in which case those only that bear the female flowers produce fruit : to 
effect the fecundation, it is necessary that there should be male plants 
growing near them. The flowers and the fruit are large, bowed pods, of 
a reddish brown color, and of a pulpy consistency within. They contain 
several large, gray seeds, which are extremely hard. The French of Upper 
Louisiana call them Gourganes. 
The name of Coffee Tree was given to this vegetable by the early emi- 
grants to Kentucky and Tennessee, who hoped to find in its seeds a substi- 
tute for coffee : but the small number of persons who made the experiment 
abandoned it, as soon as it became easy to obtain from the sea ports the 
coffee of the West Indies. 
The wood of the Coffee Tree is very compact and of a rosy hue. The 
fineness and closeness of its grain fit it for cabinet-making, and its strength 
renders it proper for building. Like the Locust, it has the valuable pro- 
perty of rapidly converting its sap into perfect wood, so that a trunk 6 inches 
in diameter has only 6 lines of sap, and may be employed almost entire. 
These qualities recommend it for propagation in the forests of the north and 
of the centre of Europe. 
The Coffee Tree was sent to France more than fifty years since. It 
thrives in the environs of Paris, where there are trees that exceed 40 feet 
in height ; but it does not yield fruit, and is multiplied only by shoots ob- 
tained by digging trenches round the old trees. The divided roots produce 
shoots 3 or 4 feet long the first year. The young trees are sought on 
account of their beautiful foliage, for the embellishment of parks and pic- 
turesque gardens. 
PLATE L. 
A branch with flowers of the natural size. Fig. 1, A pod of the natural size. 
Fig. 2, A seed of the nat ural size. 
[The Coffee tree thrives, as far north as Massachusetts. It requires a 
rich, deep, free soil, and when isolated, spreads over a large space, and is 
extremely beautiful.] 
END OF VOL. I. 
