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vessel is completed. There is a fibrous substance in the leaves of the cabbage-tree, which is sometimes spun like hemp into different kinds of cordage. The sockets and grooves formed by the broad part of the foot stalks of the leaves are used by the negroes as cradles for their children. The trunks, when cleared of the pith, serve as water-pipes and gutters, and of the pith a kind of sago is manufactured. The magney or mati-tree, affords to the natives of New Spain, where it grows copiously, water, wine, oil, vinegar, honey, syrup, thread, needles, &c. In short, there are no less than nineteen services, which this tree, though small, yields to the inhabitants. The leaves serve for covering their houses; out of its roots strong and thick ropes are made; and a fine yarn may be spun out of the fibres of the leaves; which, being converted into cloth, serves for the purpose of clothing. The bark of the pawpaw tree is manufactured by the Indians into cordage. The leaves are used as soap, and the stem is converted into water-pipes. It is said that a small quantity of the juice when rubbed upon butchermeat, renders it tender without hurting its quality. The plantain and the banana-the sago-palm and the sugarcane of the tropical regions, as well as the fig-tree of the East, and the sugar-maple of North America, and the cow-tree, mentioned by Humboldt, and the butter-tree of Mungo Park, and the coffee and the tea-tree, and an endless variety of others, contribute to our wants in the form of food. Besides the pitcher-plant, there are several others which yield a supply of refreshing water.

But we must not let these remarkable instances carry away our thoughts, from the no less useful, though much more common, blessings of Providence, in these respects. Let it never be forgotten, that the vine, which furnishes the "wine that maketh glad the heart of man;" the apple and the pear-trees, which furnish such an abundant supply of cider and perry; the currant, the mulberry, and the elder, whose juices are so often employed in our home-made wines; and the hop, so much used in the process of brewing, are all most widely diffused in the garden of creation, and contribute each their quota towards supplying us with a nutritious, pleasant, and

wholesome beverage. But it is not only in the form of meat and drink, that these vegetable productions administer their services; for it is well known, that we are indebted to the cotton plants of America and the Indies for our calicoes and muslins, our fustians and corduroys, and other articles of clothing.

Infinite is the number of those vegetable treasures, which are of use to us as medicine. The salt-tree of Chili yields a daily supply of fine salt. The cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, and pimenta-trees, as well as the pepper, and some other shrubs, furnish us with an abundant supply of spices. The candle-berry myrtle presents the inhabitants of Nankin with a substitute for animal tallow. The American wax-tree produces a berry, which affords a useful kind of wax. The inner rind of the Egyptian papyrus furnished the ancients with a very simple material to write upon, as well as baskets, and slime-bedaubed boats; and by the moderns, this useful and beautifully graceful plant is still employed in various manufactures. The caoutchouc or syringe-tree yields a supply of that wonderfully elastic substance, called Indian rubber. Few plants are more extensively useful than the bamboo of the tropical regions, with which, in many places, the houses are almost wholly built, and the furniture nearly all constructed. The enormous leaves of the fan-palm, one of which is said to be sufficiently large to shelter twenty men, serve in the construction of tents, and in the covering of huts and cottages; and the American palmetto or thatch-tree would also appear, from its name, to be well adapted for this latter purpose.

Some trees are made, under the hands of the artificer, to contribute their services in the form of wood or timber. Some offer their services by means of the bark, as the Peruvian-bark-tree of South America, and the cinnamon and cassia of Ceylon and the East Indies. Some present their offerings in the shape of nuts, as the cashew, the hazel, the chesnut, and the walnut; some in the form of a softer fruit, as the apple, the pear, the cherry, and the plum. Some yield their services in the form of leaves, as the senna and the tea shrubs; others, in those of buds, as the clove and caper plants; while others, as the fra

grant jasmine of Malabar, give out from their flowers a grateful perfume. Some exude from their pores a plentiful supply of resins and gums; some, as the olive and cajeput trees, furnish us with valuable oils; others supply us with a number of useful dyes; and the Spanish barilla, and prickly and shrubby saltwort, yield from their ashes a quantity of soda. Popular Philosophy.

III-PALMS.

THE Palm trees, from their lofty stature and elegant form, have been denominated the princes of the vegetable kingdom. They bear no resemblance to any of the trees in this country; they shoot up with a simple stem, of a straight cylindrical form, to a height varying from thirty to one hundred and fifty feet. The stem is crowned with a bunch of waving branches or leaves, of different forms in different species of palm, but in all large, and in some of prodigious size.

The Fan-palm is a native of India, rising to the height of thirty feet, and terminated with a bunch of fan-shaped leaves. The wood, which is hard and durable, is employed in building, and in the construction of domestic implements; the liquid which flows from the wounded tree, affords, by evaporation, saccharine matter, and a spirit when it is fermented and distilled; screens and parasols are made of the entire leaves; and, divided into slips, they are converted into mats of various kinds, or cut into small pieces, are used as a substitute for writing paper. The wood of the Palmetto, or Fanleafed palm, common in America and Jamaica, is also very durable; and the leaves are used for thatching cottages.

The Palm-oil Tree is a native of Guinea; the seeds being boiled in water yield the palm-oil, a valuable article of commerce; and from the fermented liquid obtained by tapping the tree, palm-wine is made.

The Mountain Cabbage Tree, which is one of the most stately and most beautiful of the palm tribe, is a native of the West Indies, and common in many parts of

Jamaica, where it grows to the height of one hundred or one hundred and fifty feet. Near the ground it is often seven feet in circumference; and tapering as it ascends, the ash-coloured bark is changed into a deep sea-green at twenty or thirty feet from the top; it is terminated by pinnated leaves, some of which are twenty feet long, with leaflets often three feet long. When the green bark immediately under the branches is removed, and the husky tegument taken off, the pith or cabbage part is discovered, of a snow white colour, as thick as a man's arm, and round like a polished ivory cylinder. It is composed of tender longitudinal white flakes, like silk ribbands, but so close that they appear like a solid body. This substance, when eaten raw, resembles in taste the kernel of an almond, but is more tender and delicious. When boiled it has nearly the taste of cauliflower.

The Betel-nut Tree is a native of India. This palm rises to a great height, and is terminated with six or eight leaves six feet long. The betel-nut is cut in slices, sprinkled with slaked lime, and wrapped in pepper leaves, with other aromatic drugs sometimes added; after such preparation it is used as tobacco is in Europe, and forms an important article of trade in the east, the chewing of betel being a very general practice in eastern countries.

Its

The Cocoa-nut Tree, whose various uses have already been noticed, is a native of almost every tropical region, being found both in the East and West Indies. stately column, rising to the height of fifty or sixty feet, has a crown of waving branches or leaves fifteen feet in length. It is of slow growth, but when it reaches maturity it lives long, and produces fruit three or four times a year. Under the foliage there are bunches of blossoms, clusters of green fruit, and others arrived at maturity, all seen at the same time in mingled beauty. The covering of the young fruit is very curious, resembling a piece of thick cloth in a conical form, close and firm as if it came from the loom : it expands after the fruit has burst through its enclosure, and then appears of a coarser texture. The nuts are about the size of the human head; they contain a delicious milk, and a kernel sweet as the

almond. By wounding the upper part of the tree, which is green and tender, a sweet thick liquor of an agreeable flavour, called tarce or tody, oozes out in gentle drops.

The Sago-palm is a native of India, Japan, and China, and affords the nutritious substance known by that name. The sago is the medullary part, or pith of the plant, which is formed into a paste with water, and when it begins to dry is granulated by passing it through a perforated plate; it is then dried, and appears in the form of roundish grains like seeds, for which it is taken by those who are unacquainted with the origin of this useful substance.

The Wax-palm, called also Andicola, from its native station in the Andes, seems to be the loftiest vegetable production on the globe; it rises to the height of two hundred feet, and is a remarkable exception to the tribe of palms, which are natives of warmer regions; for although it raises its majestic head on the mountain Quindiu, near the middle of the torrid zone, it grows at an elevation of nearly 6000 feet above the level of the sea, and is confined to a space of fifteen or twenty leagues. A peculiar matter, which, by chemical analysis, is found to be composed of two-thirds resin and one-third of a substance resembling wax, exudes from the trunk of the tree, and being collected by the inhabitants, is melted with tallow, and made into candles. This is altogether a different tree from the Tallow tree of China.

But of the many useful species of palm, the Date tree is not the least important. To the inhabitants of many extensive regions of Asia and Africa, the date tree is the most valuable vegetable production of their clime. It grows with a straight cylindrical stem to the height of thirty or forty feet, thickly set on the upper part with scales, which are the vestiges of old leaves, and is terminated by a bunch of leaves nine or ten feet in length. The fruit is composed of a fine soft pulp, of a sweet and slightly vinous taste, and of a very wholesome and nutritious quality.

The date tree is a native of the sandy districts of India, Arabia, and the northern regions of Africa; it grows also in the southern parts of Spain, in some of the

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