Not only does this tree supply food, but clothing, and numerous other conveniences of life. The inner bark, which is white, and composed of a net-like series of fibres, is formed into a kind of cloth. The wood is soft, smooth, and of yellowish colour; and is used for the building of boats and houses. In whatever part the tree is wounded, a glutinous milky juice issues, which, when boiled with cocoa-nut oil ([233]), is employed for making bird-lime, and as a cement for filling up cracks in such vessels as are intended for holding water. Some parts of the flowers serve as tinder in the lighting of fire; and the leaves are used for wrapping up food, and for other purposes.
As the climate of the South Sea Islands is considered not much to differ from that of the West Indies, it was (about thirty years ago) thought desirable that some of the trees should be transferred, in a growing state, to our islands there. Consequently, his Majesty's ship the Bounty, in 1787, sailed for this purpose to the South Seas, under the command of Lieutenant, afterwards Admiral Bligh. But a fatal mutiny of the ship's crew prevented the accomplishment of this benevolent design. The commander of the vessel, however, returned in safety to his country; and a second expedition under the same person, and for the same purpose, was fitted out in the year 1791. Captain Bligh arrived in safety at Otaheite, and, after an absence from England of about eighteen months, landed in Jamaica with 352 bread fruit-trees, in a living state, having left many others at different places in his passage thither. From Jamaica these trees were transferred to other islands; but the negroes, having a general and long established predilection for the plantain ([270]), the bread fruit is not much relished by them. Where, however, it has not been generally introduced as an article of food, it is used as a delicacy; and whether employed as bread, or in the form of pudding, it is considered highly palatable by the European inhabitants.
221. The JACK FRUIT is a species of bread fruit that is grown in Malabar and other parts of the East Indies.
The tree which produces this fruit (Artocarpus integrifolia) differs from the common bread fruit-tree, in having the leaves entire, each about a span in length, oblong, blunt, serrated at the edges, bright green, and very smooth on the upper surface, paler beneath, and clad with stiff hairs.
Few of the fruits even of eastern climates are so large as this. Its weight is sometimes upwards of thirty pounds; and it generally contains betwixt two and three hundred nuts or seeds. These are each about three times as large as an almond, of somewhat oval shape, blunt at one end, sharp at the other, and a little flatted on the sides. Some varieties of the fruit, however, contain no nuts.
The season in which the jack fruit is in perfection is about the month of December. Though esteemed by many persons, it is so difficult of digestion, that great caution is requisite in eating it. The unripe fruit is sometimes pickled; it is sometimes cut into slices, and boiled as a vegetable for the table; and sometimes fried in palm-oil. The nuts are eaten roasted, and the wood serves for building materials.
TRIANDRIA.
222. MAIZE, or INDIAN CORN (Zea mays, Fig. 58), is a species of grain much cultivated in America and other climates: the grains are of yellow colour, somewhat shaped like flattened peas, and grow closely set round the upper part of high perpendicular stalks.
To the inhabitants of many countries of warm climates the cultivation of maize is a very important pursuit. These plants are propagated by sowing the seed in rows, in March, April, or May: they generally produce two crops in the year, and yield, according to the soil, from fifteen to forty bushels per acre. As soon as they are ripe, the ears are gathered. They are shortly afterwards threshed, and the grain, when separated, is spread out to dry in the sun; for, if it were heaped together in this state, it would ferment, and sprout or grow.
The American Indians parch this kind of corn over a fire, in such manner as not to burn it. Afterwards they pound it, sift the meal and preserve it for their chief food. They make it into puddings and cakes, or bread, the quality of which is extremely nutritive. Maize is useful for poultry and cattle of every kind; and, if converted into malt, a wholesome beverage may be brewed from it. Of the leafy husk which surrounds the ear of the maize a beautiful kind of writing paper is manufactured at a paper-mill near Rimini in Italy; and a greyish paper may be manufactured from the whole plant. The stalks are said to afford an excellent winter food for cattle. When the young ears are beginning to form, they have a sweet and agreeable taste. If, in this state, the leaves be stripped off, and the ears be subjected to pressure, a pleasant and palatable milky juice may be obtained from them.