138 HISTORY OF THE [book v. 
not, I believe, be estimated on an average at more 
than four thousand bags of one hundred weight 
each, which may be worth, at the London mar¬ 
ket, between ten and eleven' thousand pounds 
sterling.* 
* The cacao tree, both in size and shape, somewhat resembles a 
young black-beart cherry. The flower is of a saffron colour, ex¬ 
tremely beautiful, and the pods, which in a green state are much like 
a cucumber, proceed immediately from all parts of the body and larger 
branches. As they ripen, they change their colour, and turn to a fine 
bluish red, almost purple, with pink coloured veins. This is the com¬ 
mon sort; but there is a larger species, which produces pods of a delicate 
yellow or lemon colour. Each pod may contain from twenty to thir¬ 
ty nuts or kernels, notunlike almonds, which are again enclosed in a 
white pulpy substance, soft and sweet, and immediately enveloped in 
a parchment shell. These nuts, being first simply dried in the sun, 
are packed for market, and require very little preparation, after re¬ 
moving the shell, to be made into good chocolate. The cakes which 
are generally used under this name in England, appear to me to be 
composed of not more than one half of genuine cacao; the remainder 
I take to be flour, and Castile soap. Considered medicinally, choco¬ 
late is said to be too heavy for weak and relaxed stomachs; but in the 
West Indies, experienceabundantly demonstrates thatit is in the highest 
degree balsamic and restorative.—Colonel Montague James of Jamai¬ 
ca, who was the first white person born after the conquest of the 
island by the English, lived to the great age of one hundred and four, 
and for the last thirty years of his life used scarce any other food than 
chocolate. 
