Wanderings in New South Wales, Batavia, Pedir Coast, Singapore, and China (Volume 2); Being the Journal of a Naturalist in Those Countries During 1832

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1834. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... APPENDIX. THE COCOA-NUT TREE. (See Page 405, Vol. i.J The Indian's nut alone Is clothing, meat and trencher, drink and can, Boat, cable, sail, and needle, all in one. Of all the trees, beautiful either in form, height, or the splendid colour of their flowers, so profusely scattered over the face of nature in tropical climes, perhaps none has excited more interest, both for its elegant and majestic growth, as well as for its utility, than this palm, producing fruit, shade, utensils, and numerous other articles, to supply the wants of mankind. These palms impart a grandeur to the tropical landscape; their stems, towering to a great elevation, are crowned at the summit by elegant fronds of gigantic character; they overtop the more diminutive trees, and excite the admiration of the traveller by their elegant and novel appearance, decorating the sea-coasts of large continents, and waving their dark plumes over the insignificant coral-reefs. The cylindrical rough trunk* towers to an elevation of one hundred feet, and the terminating crown of feathered fronds gives to them an elegant appearance, more so when seen loaded with fruit in all its different stages, from the first bursting of the spathe displaying the delicate white fruit and minute flowers, to the huge, fully mature nut, in bunches of from twenty to thirty, or more, the ponderous burthen appearing to be suspended on a very fragile stalk. The fecundity of the palms is surprising; a single spathe of the date is said to contain about twelve thousand male flowers; Alfonsia amygdalina has been computed to have two hundred and seven thousand in a spathe, or six hundred thousand upon a single individual, while every bunch of the Seje-palm of the Orinoco bears eight thousand fruit.j On the cocoa-palm, ...