460 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[October, 
The Doctor’s Talks. 
My talk about the Banana and Pine-apple appears 
to have created an interest in other tropical fruits. 
One of my young friends wishes to know about 
the Bread-fruit Tree, which he has seen mentioned. 
He cannot understand how anything like “ bread ” 
IN TROPICAL CLIMATES 
the people require little animal food. They live 
almost entirely upon fruits, etc. The bread-fruit 
affords an abundant supply during eight or nine 
months in the year. It is said that if a native of 
one of the South Sea Islands plants half a dozen 
bread-fruit trees, he has made ample provision 
for all the “ bread ” that he may eat during his 
BRANCH OF THE BREAD-FRUIT .—Engraved for the American Agriculturist. 
can grow upon a tree, and would like to know 
more about it. The Bread-fruit is so called because 
it answers in the place of bread. It is produced 
by a tree, a native of the Society Islands and of 
several other islands in the tropical part of the Pa¬ 
cific Ocean, and is even found upon the main land 
in some parts of Asia. The tree is closely related 
to the fig, the mulberry, and 
especially to the osage-orange. 
Those of my young friends who 
have seen the fruit of the osage- 
orange, not rare in many parts 
of the West, where there are old 
hedges of this plant, can have a 
good idea of the external ap¬ 
pearance of the fruit of the 
bread-fruit tree, by imagining 
an osage-orauge as large as his 
head, or larger. The engraving 
shows a small branch of the 
bread-fruit tree, with the fruit, 
and the male flowers. The osage- 
orange fruit has seeds surround¬ 
ed by a dry, fibrous substance ; 
in the bread-fruit there are no 
seeds, but the whole mass is 
filled with a starchy, pulpy mat¬ 
ter, which, when roasted, tastes 
much like new bread. If allow¬ 
ed to become fully ripe, the 
bread-fruit is not esteemed, but 
when full grown, and before it 
is ripe, it is gathered for use. 
THE NATIVES PREPARE IT 
by making stones very hot; a 
hole having been dug in the 
ground, the hot stones are 
placed in the bottom; large 
leaves of the banana, or plan¬ 
tain, are placed on the stones ; 
upon these are laid the bread¬ 
fruits, usually quartered and a 
woody core removed. Other 
leaves are placed over the fruit, and the hole filled 
up with earth. The heat of the stones will, in a 
few hours,completely cook the bread-fruit; the oven 
is then carefully opened, and it is removed for use. 
life. So productive and long-lived are the trees. 
What is a Mirage? 
Recently the papers have given notices of won¬ 
derful mirages that have been seen upon the coasts 
of Europe, and it is not strange that some of my 
young friends should ask about them. The name, 
mirage, is a French one, meaning “to loom up.” 
causes a mirage, I must first describe how they 
look. Sometimes places very far distant appear to 
be close at hand and seen in the air; at sea 
ships known to he many miles distant are seen as 
if suspended in the air. In travelling across the 
continent I have seen many a mirage. In the dis¬ 
tance would appear a beautiful sheet of water, 
with headlands, islands, and sometimes a fort could 
be plainly seen, and even ships. As to water, the 
illusion was so perfect that it was difficult to be¬ 
lieve that it was not real. In the early days of 
travel to California by trains of wagons overland, 
many of the parties suffered greatly, and some were 
entirely lost, by pushing out for what seemed to be 
water. Sad, indeed, are the stories told of this mis¬ 
take. The engraving here given of a mirage upon 
an African desert will give you an idea of its ap¬ 
pearance as I have seen it on the far Western plains. 
WHAT CAUSES THE MIRAGE? 
This is not easy to explain, unless you know 
something about light. Most of you have noticed 
that when you place an oar or a pole in the clear 
water of a pond or river, it seems to be bent. If 
you look across a hot stove, the objects on the 
other side appear to be curiously distorted and out 
of place. Rays of light passing from a denser 
medium to a lighter one, are bent out of a straight 
course. Thus, when they pass from an oar or a 
pole in the water, they are bent, and the object ap¬ 
pears to be crooked. When they pass from com¬ 
mon air through much lighter, heated air, the ob¬ 
jects seem to be bent out of their shape. Now all 
the mirages I have seen, have been where the soil 
became very hot from the sun ; this hot soil heated 
the air just above it. There was a layer of hot air 
close to the earth and just above, the other air was 
not heated. Objects seen at a distance through 
these two kinds of air, were singularly distorted, 
and, like things seen across the hot air of a stove, 
much out of shape. In this state of the air a bar¬ 
ren, sandy tract looks like water, and clumps of 
bushes are distorted to look like trees. Wherever a 
mirage has been examined, the appearance has 
been found to be caused by a difference in the 
density of the air, whether from contact with 
heated earth, or, seen at sea, with heated water. 
MIRAGE IN THE DESERT .—Engraved for the American Agriculturist. 
It should be pronounced mee-razh, as near as the 
pronunciation can be written. In some countries 
a mirage is very rare; in others it is almost of 
daily occurrence. Before I try to tell you what 
Mirage is a very interesting phenomenon to see 
once or twice, but when it occurs day after day, 
one soon tires of its unnatural appearance, and 
prefers to look upon a landscape that is real. 
