A Catechism of Familiar Things; Their History, and the Events Which Led to Their Discovery. With a Short Explanation of Some of the Principal Natural Phenomena. For the Use of Schools and Families. Enlarged and Revised Edition.

CHAPTER XI.

YAMS, MAN­GOES, BREAD-​FRUIT, SHEA OR BUT­TER TREE, COW TREE, WA­TER TREE, LICORICE, MAN­NA, OPI­UM, TO­BAC­CO, AND GUM.

What are Yams?

The roots of a climb­ing plant grow­ing in trop­ical cli­mates. The root of the yam is whole­some and well-​fla­vored; near­ly as large as a man's leg, and of an ir­reg­ular form. Yams are much used for food in those coun­tries where they grow; the na­tives ei­ther roast or boil them, and the white peo­ple grind them in­to flour, of which they make bread and pud­dings. The yam is of a dirty brown col­or out­side, but white and mealy with­in.

What are Man­goes?

The fruit of the Man­go Tree, a na­tive of In­dia and the south-​west­ern parts of Asia; it al­so grows abun­dant­ly in the West In­dies and Brazil. It was in­tro­duced in­to Ja­maica in 1782; where it at­tains the height of thir­ty or forty feet, with thick and wide-​ex­tend­ed branch­es. The va­ri­eties of the man­go are very nu­mer­ous,--up­wards of eighty are cul­ti­vat­ed; and the qual­ity of these varies ac­cord­ing to the coun­tries and sit­ua­tions in which they grow. The man­goes of Asia are said to be much bet­ter than those of Amer­ica.

De­scribe the ap­pear­ance of the Man­go Tree.

The flow­ers of this tree are small and whitish, formed in pyra­mi­dal clus­ters. The fruit has some re­sem­blance to a short thick cu­cum­ber, about the size of a goose's egg; its taste is de­li­cious and cool­ing; it has a stone in the cen­tre, like that of a peach. At first this fruit is of a fine green col­or, and some va­ri­eties con­tin­ue so, while oth­ers change to a fine gold­en or or­ange col­or. The man­go tree is an ev­er­green, bear­ing fruit once or twice a year, from six or sev­en years old to a hun­dred.

_Pyra­mi­dal_, re­sem­bling a pyra­mid.

How is this fruit eat­en?

When ripe, it is eat­en by the na­tives ei­ther in its nat­ural state, or bruised in wine. It is brought to us ei­ther can­died or pick­led, as the ripe fruit is very per­ish­able; in the lat­ter case, they are opened with a knife, and the mid­dle filled up with fresh gin­ger, gar­lic, mus­tard, salt, and oil or vine­gar. The fruit of the largest va­ri­ety weighs two pounds or up­wards. The sev­er­al parts of this tree are all ap­plied to some use by the Hin­doos: the wood is con­se­crat­ed to the ser­vice of the dead; from the flour of the dried ker­nels dif­fer­ent kinds of food are pre­pared; the leaves, flow­ers, and bark, are medic­inal.

_Medic­inal_, fit for medicine, pos­sess­ing med­ical prop­er­ties.

_Con­se­crat­ed_, sep­arat­ed from a com­mon to a sa­cred use.

Is there not a tree which bears a fruit that may be used for bread?

Yes; the Bread-​fruit Tree, orig­inal­ly found in the south­east­ern parts of Asia and the is­lands of the Pa­cif­ic Ocean, though in­tro­duced in­to the trop­ical parts of Amer­ica. It is one of the most in­ter­est­ing, as well as sin­gu­lar pro­duc­tions of the veg­etable king­dom, be­ing no less beau­ti­ful than it is use­ful. This tree is large and shady; its leaves are broad and in­dent­ed, like those of the fig tree--from twelve to eigh­teen inch­es long, rather fleshy, and of a dark green. The fruit, when full-​grown, is from six to nine inch­es round, and of an oval form--when ripe, of a rich, yel­low tinge; it gen­er­al­ly hangs in clus­ters of two or three, on a small thick stalk; the pulp is white, part­ly fari­na­ceous, and part­ly fi­brous, but when ripe, be­comes yel­low and juicy.

_In­dent­ed_, toothed like the edge of a saw.

_Fari­na­ceous_, mealy, con­sist­ing of meal or flour; from _fa­ri­na_, flour.

How is the Bread-​Fruit eat­en?

It is roast­ed un­til the out­side is of a brown col­or and crisp; the pulp has then the con­sis­ten­cy of bread, which the taste great­ly re­sem­bles; and thus it forms a nour­ish­ing food: it is al­so pre­pared in many dif­fer­ent ways, be­sides that just men­tioned. The tree pro­duces three, some­times four crops in a year, and con­tin­ues bear­ing for fifty years, so that two or three trees are enough for a man's year­ly sup­ply. Its tim­ber, which at first is of a rich yel­low, but af­ter­wards as­sumes the col­or of ma­hogany, is used in the build­ing of hous­es and ca­noes; the flow­ers, when dried, serve as tin­der; the sap or juice serves for glue; the in­ner bark is made, by the na­tives of some of the is­lands of the Pa­cif­ic Ocean, in­to a kind of cloth; and the leaves are use­ful for many pur­pos­es. One species of the bread-​fruit, called the Ja­ca tree, grows chiefly on the main­land of Asia.

_Main­land_, the con­ti­nent.

De­scribe the Ja­ca Tree.

This kind grows to the same, if not a larg­er size than the bread-​fruit of the is­lands, but is nei­ther so palat­able nor so nu­tri­tious; the fruit of­ten weighs thir­ty pounds, and con­tains two or three hun­dred seeds, each four times as large as an al­mond. De­cem­ber is the time when the fruit ripens; it is then eat­en, but not much rel­ished; the seeds are al­so eat­en when roast­ed. There are al­so oth­er trees in dif­fer­ent parts of the world, most­ly of the palm species, which yield bread of a sim­ilar kind.

Is there not a tree which pro­duces a sub­stance re­sem­bling the But­ter which we make from the milk of the cow?

The Shea, or But­ter Tree, a na­tive of Africa: it is sim­ilar in ap­pear­ance to the Amer­ican oak, and the fruit, (from the ker­nel of which the but­ter is pre­pared,) is some­what like an olive in form. The ker­nel is in­closed in a sweet pulp, un­der a thin, green rind.

How is the But­ter ex­tract­ed?

The ker­nel, be­ing tak­en out and dried in the sun, is boiled in wa­ter; by which pro­cess a white, firm, and rich-​fla­vored but­ter is pro­duced, which will keep for a whole year with­out salt. The growth and prepa­ra­tion of this com­mod­ity is one of the first ob­jects of African in­dus­try, and forms a prin­ci­pal ar­ti­cle of their trade with one an­oth­er.

You have giv­en me an ac­count of a use­ful But­ter pre­pared from a plant; is there not al­so a tree which can sup­ply the want of a cow?

In South Amer­ica there is a tree, the juice of which is a nour­ish­ing milk; it is called the Cow Tree. This tree is very fine; the leaves are broad, and some of them ten inch­es long; the fruit is rather fleshy, and con­tains one or two nuts or ker­nels. The milk is very abun­dant, and is pro­cured by in­ci­sions made in the trunk of the tree; it is tol­er­ably thick, and of a gluti­nous qual­ity, a pleas­ant taste, and agree­able smell. The ne­groes and peo­ple at work on the farms drink it, dip­ping in­to it their bread made of maize.

_Gluti­nous_, hav­ing the qual­ity of glue,--an ad­he­sive, gum­my sub­stance, pre­pared from the skins of an­imals: it is used in join­ing wood, &c., and for many oth­er pur­pos­es.

What time of the day is the best for draw­ing the juice?

Sun­rise; the blacks and na­tives then has­ten from all quar­ters with large bowls to re­ceive the milk; some drink it on the spot, oth­ers car­ry it home to their fam­ilies.

What is­land pos­sess­es a re­mark­able sub­sti­tute for the want of springs of Wa­ter?

Fer­ro, one of the Ca­nary Isles, sit­uat­ed in the At­lantic Ocean. In this is­land there is no wa­ter, ex­cept on a part of the beach which is near­ly in­ac­ces­si­ble; to sup­ply the place of a foun­tain, Na­ture has be­stowed on the is­land a par­tic­ular kind of tree, un­known in oth­er parts of the world. It is of a mod­er­ate size, with straight, long, ev­er­green leaves; on its top a small cloud con­tin­ual­ly rests, which so drench­es the leaves with mois­ture, that it per­pet­ual­ly dis­tils up­on the ground a stream of clear wa­ter. To these trees, as to peren­ni­al springs, the in­hab­itants of Fer­ro re­pair, and are sup­plied with abun­dance of wa­ter for them­selves and cat­tle.

_Peren­ni­al_, last­ing through the year, per­pet­ual.

What is Licorice?

A plant, the juice of which is squeezed from the roots, and then boiled with sug­ar, and used as a rem­edy for coughs, &c. Great quan­ti­ties are ex­port­ed from Spain, Italy, &c. The dried root is of great use in medicine, and makes an ex­cel­lent drink for colds and oth­er af­fec­tions of the lungs by boil­ing it with lin­seed.

What are the Lungs?

The or­gans of res­pi­ra­tion in man and many oth­er an­imals. There are two of these or­gans, one on each side of the chest.

_Res­pi­ra­tion_, breath­ing; the act of in­hal­ing air in­to the lungs, and again ex­pelling it, by which an­imal life is sup­port­ed.

What is Man­na?

A sweet, white juice, ooz­ing from the branch­es and leaves of a kind of ash tree, grow­ing chiefly in the south­ern parts of Italy, dur­ing the heats of sum­mer. When dry, it is very light, eas­ily crum­bled, and of a whitish, or pale yel­low col­or, not un­like hard­ened hon­ey.

Is Man­na pe­cu­liar to the Ash Tree of South­ern Italy?

No. Man­na is noth­ing more than the nu­tri­tious juices of the tree, which ex­ude dur­ing the sum­mer heats; and what con­firms this is, that the very hot sum­mers are al­ways those which are most pro­duc­tive of man­na. Sev­er­al dif­fer­ent species of trees pro­duce a kind of man­na; the best and most used is, how­ev­er, that of Cal­abria, in Italy.

What are its us­es?

It was much es­teemed for­mer­ly in medicine, but it has now gone near­ly in­to dis­use. The peas­ants of Mount Libanus eat it as oth­ers do hon­ey. The Bedouin Arabs con­sume great quan­ti­ties, con­sid­er­ing it the great­est dain­ty their coun­try af­fords. In Mex­ico, they are said to have a man­na which they eat as we do cheese. At Bri­an­con, in France, they col­lect it from all sorts of trees that grow there, and the in­hab­itants ob­serve, that such sum­mers as pro­duce the great­est quan­ti­ties of man­na are very fa­tal to the trees, many of them per­ish­ing in the win­ter.

Is there not an­oth­er tree which pro­duces Man­na?

Yes: the Tamarisk, a tree pe­cu­liar to Pales­tine and parts of Ara­bia. This re­mark­able sub­stance is pro­duced by sev­er­al trees, and in var­ious coun­tries of the East. On Mount Sinai there is a dif­fer­ent species of Tamarisk that yields it. It is found on the branch­es of the tree, and falls on the ground dur­ing the heat of the day.

Where is Mount Libanus?

Mount Libanus, or Lebanon, is sit­uat­ed in Asi­at­ic Turkey; it was an­cient­ly fa­mous for its large and beau­ti­ful cedar trees. The “Cedars of Lebanon” are fre­quent­ly men­tioned in Holy Writ. There are now scarce­ly any re­main­ing of su­pe­ri­or size and an­tiq­ui­ty, but they vary from the largest size down to mere saplings; and their num­bers seem to in­crease rather than di­min­ish, there be­ing many young trees spring­ing up.

How is Man­na gath­ered?

From Au­gust to Septem­ber, the Ital­ians col­lect it in the fol­low­ing man­ner, _viz._: by mak­ing an in­ci­sion at the foot of the tree, each day over that of the pre­ced­ing, about four inch­es from one an­oth­er: these cuts, or in­ci­sions, are near­ly two inch­es long, and half an inch deep. When the cut is made, the man­na di­rect­ly be­gins to flow, at first like clear wa­ter, but con­geal­ing as it flows, it soon be­comes firm: this they col­lect in bas­kets. Man­na has been found to con­sist of two dis­tinct sub­stances one near­ly re­sem­bling sug­ar, the oth­er sim­ilar to a gum or mu­cilage.

What na­tion was fed with a kind of Man­na?

The Chil­dren of Is­rael, when wan­der­ing in the desert wilder­ness, where no food was to be pro­cured, were fed by a mirac­ulous sup­ply of man­na, show­ered down from Heav­en ev­ery morn­ing on the ground in such quan­ti­ties as to af­ford suf­fi­cient food for the whole host.

What is Opi­um?

A nar­cot­ic, gum­my, resinous juice, drawn from the head of the white pop­py, and af­ter­wards thick­ened; it is brought over in dark, red­dish brown lumps, which, when pow­dered, be­come yel­low.

_Nar­cot­ic_, pro­duc­ing sleep and drowsi­ness.

In what coun­tries is it cul­ti­vat­ed?

In many parts of Asia, In­dia, and even the south­ern parts of Eu­rope, whence it is ex­port­ed in­to oth­er coun­tries. The Turks, and oth­er East­ern na­tions, chew it. With us it is chiefly used in medicine. The juice is ob­tained from in­ci­sions made in the seed-​ves­sels of the plant; it is col­lect­ed in earth­en pots, and al­lowed to be­come suf­fi­cient­ly hard to be formed in­to roundish mass­es of about four pounds weight. In Eu­rope the pop­py is cul­ti­vat­ed most­ly for the seeds. Mor­phia and lau­danum are medic­inal prepa­ra­tions of opi­um.

What is To­bac­co?

An herba­ceous plant which flour­ish­es in many tem­per­ate cli­mates, par­tic­ular­ly in North Amer­ica; it is sup­posed to have re­ceived its name from Taba­co, a province of Mex­ico; it is cul­ti­vat­ed in the West In­dies, the Lev­ant, on the coast of Greece, in the Archipela­go, Mal­ta, Italy, France, Cey­lon, &c. It was not known in Eu­rope till the dis­cov­ery of Amer­ica by the Spaniards; and was car­ried to Eng­land about the time of Queen Eliz­abeth, ei­ther by Sir Fran­cis Drake or Sir Wal­ter Raleigh. To­bac­co is ei­ther tak­en as snuff, smoked in pipes or in the form of cigars, or chewed in the mouth like opi­um. There are many dif­fer­ent species of this plant, most of them na­tives of Amer­ica, some of the Cape of Good Hope and Chi­na. To­bac­co con­tains a pow­er­ful poi­son called nico­tine.

_Herba­ceous_, like an herb or plant, not a shrub or tree.

What part of the plant is used?

The leaves, which are stripped from the plant, and af­ter be­ing moist­ened with wa­ter, are twist­ed up in­to rolls; these are cut up by the to­bac­conist, and var­ious­ly pre­pared for sale, or re­duced in­to a scent­ed pow­der called snuff.

Who was Sir Fran­cis Drake?

Sir Fran­cis Drake was a dis­tin­guished naval of­fi­cer, who flour­ished in the reign of Eliz­abeth. He made his name im­mor­tal by a voy­age in­to the South Seas, through the Straits of Mag­el­lan; which, at that time, no En­glish­man had ev­er at­tempt­ed. He died on board his own ship in the West In­dies, 1595.

Who was Sir Wal­ter Raleigh?

Sir Wal­ter Raleigh was al­so an il­lus­tri­ous En­glish nav­iga­tor and his­to­ri­an, born in 1552. He per­formed great ser­vices for Queen Eliz­abeth, par­tic­ular­ly in the dis­cov­ery of Vir­ginia, and in the de­feat of the Span­ish Ar­ma­da; he lived in hon­or and pros­per­ity dur­ing her reign, but on the ac­ces­sion of James the First, was stripped of his fa­vor at court, un­ac­count­ably ac­cused of high trea­son, tried, and con­demned to die; be­ing re­prieved, how­ev­er, he was im­pris­oned in the Tow­er of Lon­don many years, dur­ing which time he de­vot­ed him­self to writ­ing and study. Re­ceiv­ing, at last, a com­mis­sion to go and ex­plore the gold mines at Guiana, he em­barked; but his de­sign hav­ing been be­trayed to the Spaniards, he was de­feat­ed: and on his re­turn to Eng­land, in Ju­ly, 1618, was ar­rest­ed and be­head­ed, (by or­der of the King, on his for­mer at­tain­der,) Oc­to­ber 29; suf­fer­ing his fate with great mag­na­nim­ity.

_High Trea­son_, in Eng­land, means an of­fence com­mit­ted against the sovereign. In the Unit­ed States it con­sists in levy­ing war against the gov­ern­ment, ad­her­ing to its en­emies, and giv­ing them aid and com­fort.

_Re­prieved_, respit­ed from sen­tence of death.

_Mag­na­nim­ity_, great­ness of mind, brav­ery.

What is Gum?

A mu­cilagi­nous juice, ex­ud­ing from the bark of cer­tain trees or plants, drawn thence by the warmth of the sun in the form of a gluti­nous mat­ter; and af­ter­wards by the same cause ren­dered firm and tena­cious. There are many dif­fer­ent gums, named af­ter the par­tic­ular tree or plant from which they are pro­duced.

_Mu­cilagi­nous_, con­sist­ing of mu­cilage.

_Tena­cious_, ad­her­ing close­ly.

What is the char­ac­ter of Gum?

Gum is ca­pa­ble of be­ing dis­solved in wa­ter, and form­ing with it a vis­cid trans­par­ent flu­id; but not in vi­nous spir­its or oil; it burns in the fire to a black coal, with­out melt­ing or catch­ing fire; and does not dis­solve in wa­ter at boil­ing heat. The name of _gum_ has been in­ac­cu­rate­ly giv­en to sev­er­al species of gum-​resins, which con­sist of resin and var­ious oth­er sub­stances, flow­ing from many kinds of trees, and be­com­ing hard by ex­po­sure to the air. These are sol­uble in di­lute al­co­hol. Gum is orig­inal­ly a milky liquor, hav­ing a greater quan­ti­ty of wa­ter mixed with its oily parts, and for that rea­son it dis­solves in ei­ther wa­ter or oil. An­oth­er sort is not oily, and there­fore dis­solves in wa­ter on­ly, as gum Ara­bic, the gum of the cher­ry-​tree, &c.

_Vis­cid_, thick, ropy.

_Vi­nous_, hav­ing the qual­ities of wine.

Are the last-​men­tioned sorts prop­er­ly called Gums?

No, though com­mon­ly called gums, they are on­ly dried mu­cilages, which were noth­ing else than the mu­cilagi­nous lymph is­su­ing from the ves­sels of the tree, in the same man­ner as it does from mal­lows, com­frey, and even from the cu­cum­ber; the ves­sels of which be­ing cut across, yield a lymph which is plain­ly mu­cilagi­nous, and if well dried, at length be­comes a kind of gum, or rather, a hard­ened mu­cilage.

_Lymph_, trans­par­ent flu­id.

What is Gum Ara­bic?

The juice of a small tree of the Aca­cia tribe, grow­ing in Egypt, Ara­bia Pe­traea, Pales­tine, and in dif­fer­ent parts of Amer­ica.

Are there oth­er plants or trees which pro­duce Gum, be­sides those al­ready men­tioned?

A great num­ber, though not all com­mon­ly in use. The leaves of rhubarb, the com­mon plum, and even the sloe and the lau­rel, pro­duce a clear, taste­less gum; there are al­so a num­ber of dif­fer­ent gums, brought from for­eign coun­tries, of great use in medicine and the arts. Most of the Aca­cias pro­duce gums, though the qual­ity of all is not equal­ly good.

What is Rhubarb?

A valu­able root grow­ing in Chi­na, Turkey, and Rus­sian Tar­tary. Quan­ti­ties of it are im­port­ed from oth­er parts of the world: that from Turkey is es­teemed the best. Rhubarb is al­so cul­ti­vat­ed in our gar­dens, and the stalks of the leaves are of­ten used in tarts; but the root, from the dif­fer­ence of cli­mate, does not pos­sess any medic­inal virtue.