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CHAP. I.The Description of the Cocao-Tree.
The Cocao-Tree is moderately tall and thick, and either thrives, or not, according to the Quality of the Soil wherein it grows: Upon the Coast of Caraqua, for instance, it grows considerably larger than in the Islands belonging to the French.
Its Wood is porous, and very light; the Bark is pretty firm, and of the Colour of Cinnamon, more or less dark, according to the Age of the Tree. The Leaves are about nine Inches long, and four in breadth, where they are broadest; for they grow less towards the two Extremities, where they terminate in a point: their Colour is a little darkish, but more bright above than underneath; they are joined to Stalks three Inches long, and the tenth part of an Inch broad. This Stalk, as it enters the Leaf, makes a strait Rib, a little raised along the Middle, which grows proportionably less the nearer it comes to the End. From each side of this Rib proceed thirteen or fourteen crooked Threads alternately.
As these Leaves only fall off successively, and in proportion as others grow again, this Tree never appears naked: It is always flourishing, but more especially so towards the two Solstices, than in the other Seasons.
The Blossoms, which are regular and like a Rose, but very small, and without smell, proceed from the Places from which the old Leaves fall, as it were in Bunches. A large Quantity of these fall off, for hardly Ten of a Thousand come to good, insomuch that the Earth underneath seems cover’d over with them.
Every Blossom is joined to the Tree by a slender Stalk half an Inch or a little more in length; when it is yet in the Bud, it is one Fifth of an Inch broad, and about one fourth or a little more in length: when it was least, in proportion to the Tree and the Fruit, the more strange it appeared to me, and more worthy of Attention .
When the Buds begin to blow, one may consider the Calix, the Foliage, and the Heart of the Blossom. The Calix is formed of the Cover of the Bud, divided into five Parts, or Leaves, of a very pale flesh-colour. These are succeeded by the five true Leaves of the same Colour, which fill up the empty Spaces or Partitions of the Calix. These Leaves have two Parts, the undermost of which is like an oblong Cup, striped with Purple; on the inside, it bends towards the Center by the help of a Stamen, which serves to fasten it; from this proceeds outwardly, the other Part of the Leaf, which seems to be separate from it, and is formed like the End of a Pike.
The Heart is composed of five Threads and five Stamina, with the Pistilla in the middle. The Threads are strait, and of a purple Colour, and placed over-against the Intervals of the Leaves. The Stamina are white, and bend outwardly with a kind of a Button on the top, which insinuates itself into the middle of each Leaf to sustain itself.
When one looks at these small Objects through a Microscope, one is ready to say, That the Point of the Threads is like Silver, and that the Stamina are Chrystal; as well as the Pistilla, which Nature seems to have placed in the Center, either to be the Primitiæ of the young Fruit, or to serve to defend it, if it be true that this Embryo unfolds itself, and is produced in no other place but the Base.
For want of observing these small Parts, as well as the Bulk of the Blossom, F. Plumier had no distinct Knowledge of them, nor has he exactly design’d them, any more than Mons. Tournefort, who has done them after his Draught .
The Cocao-Tree almost all the Year bears Fruit of all Ages, which ripen successively, but never grow on the end of little Branches, as our Fruits in Europe do, but along the Trunk and the chief Boughs, which is not rare in these Countries, where several Trees do the like; such as the Cocoeiers, the Apricots of St....