2 62 
DATE TREE. 
tains a fine, soft, and pulpy fruit, which is firm, 
sweet, and somewhat vinous to the taste, esculent 
and wholesome: within this is enclosed a solid, 
tough, and hard kernel, of a pale gray colour, con- 
vex on one side, and furrowed on the other. 
The date tree grows naturally, and is likewise 
cultivated, in the sandy parts of India, Arabia, and 
the northern parts of Africa, in the southern parts 
of Spain, and in the southern islands of the Medi- 
terranean : it is also met with in France, on the 
borders of this sea; but the situation does not seem 
congenial to them, as they seldom bring their fruit 
to full maturity. It is chiefly in Arabia and in the 
country beyond Mount Atlas that it thrives in all 
its luxury, and produces the best fruit. 
Desfontaines and Cavanilles are the best authors, 
among the moderns, that have described this useful 
tree ; the first in his appendix to the Flora Atlan- 
tica, and the last in the second volume of his leones 
Plantarum. To the former of these gentlemen we 
are chiefly indebted for the following observations 
respecting the manner of cultivating the tree in 
Barbary, and the different uses to which it is ap- 
plied : — All that part of the Zaara which is near 
Mount Atlas, and the only part of this vast desert 
which is inhabited, produces very little corn ; the 
soil, being sandy and burnt up by the sun, is almost 
entirely unfit for the cultivation of grain ; the only 
production of that kind being a little barley, maize, 
and forgo. The date tree, however, supplies the 
deficiency of corn to the inhabitants of these coun- 
