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346 FJRUITS IN THEIR SEASON.
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
" " ——"" The Walnut Traces Its Noble Gen...
and drinking" forming the cMef amusements , and the men being commonly in a state of complete intoxication throughout the two
days of the _fSte . The tree , baptized by Humboldt with the name of JBerthollia excelsamay almost be said to have been discovered b _^
, that eminent traveller , so meagre was the information concerning * it before his description was made public ; for though the triangular
seeds were early known in Europe , and had even been an article of commerce for above a centurythere was so little acquaintance
, with the manner of their growth , that it was generally supposed they grew each one on a separate stalk . As the name imports , they
are natives of Brazil , flourishing chiefly in mighty forests on the banks of the Amazon and Orinoco , the tree being * one of the most
majestic in the New World , growing rapidly , and attaining the height of about a hundred and twenty feetthough the trunk rarely
exceeds a yard in diameter . The branches , bend downwards like palm frondsthe leaveswhich are more than two feet in length ,
, , growing chiefly at the extremities . Humboldt "was not in the country during the blossoming season , and the natives varied in their
statements as to even the color of the flowers , some saying that they were violetothers afliraiing them to be yellow . The fruit , which
, does not make its appearance before the tree has attained its fifteenth yearis a drupe as large as a child's headand externally not unlike
, , a cocoa-nut , the woody part ripening in about two months after its development into a pericarp or shell half an inch thick , and so hard
that the sharpest saw can hardly penetrate it . To the central partition are attached the seeds or nuts , from fifteen to twenty-two being *
the general number in each , and as these become loosened in time , their rattlewhen the fruit falls from the tree- is a most tantalizing
, , sound to the poor monkeys , who , passionately fond of the nuts , are quite unable to break open the strong box in which nature has
treasured them , and must therefore wait until the process of decay accomplishes this for themwhen they too hold their juvia festival
, , joined in by squirrels , parrots , and most other small denizens of the forest , for the shells of the individual seeds offer no insuperable
obstacle . The continual falling of such large bodies from so great a height , hard and heavy as they are , renders it rather dangerous
to pass under these trees when the fruit is fully ripe ; and it used to be said that in some places the savages were accustomed to carry
wooden shields over their heads when they entered the forest at this seasonbut Humboldt did not find that the people among whom . he
, travelled The subject availed of themselves nuts should of hardl any y such be discussed precaution without . adverting
for a moment to two or three other kinds , which , though rarely forming a portion of our dessert in this country , are yet well known
to most people , and whose general exclusion from the company of their more favored brethren is due perhaps to the capricious frown
of fashion rather than to their being really deficient in merit . The
green kernelled pistachio nut , for instance , in Sicily , where it is
346 Fjruits In Their Season.
346 _FJRUITS IN THEIR _SEASON .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Jan. 1, 1861, page 346, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01011861/page/58/
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