409. Theobroma cacao.—This plant produces the well-known cacao, or chocolate, and is very extensively cultivated in South America and the West India Islands. The fruit, which is about 8 to 10 inches in length by 3 to 5 in breadth, contains between fifty and a hundred seeds, and from these the cacao is prepared. As an article of food it contains a large amount of nutritive matter, about 50 per cent being fat. It contains a peculiar principle, which is called theobromine.
410. Theophrasta jussiæi.—A native of St. Domingo, where it is sometimes called Le petit Coca. The fruit is succulent, and bread is made from the seeds.
411. Thespesia populnea.—A tropical tree, belonging to the mallow family. The inner bark of the young branches yields a tough fiber, fit for cordage, and used in Demerara for making coffee bags, and the finer pieces of it for cigar envelopes. The wood is considered almost indestructible under water, and its hardness and durability render it valuable for various purposes. The flower buds and unripe fruits yield a viscid yellow juice, useful as a dye, and a thick, deep, red-colored oil is expressed from the seeds.
412. Thevetia neriifolia.—This shrubby plant is common in the West Indies and in many parts of Central America. Its bark abounds in a poisonous milky juice, and is said to possess powerful properties. A clear, bright, yellow-colored oil, called Exile oil, is obtained, by expression, from the seeds.
413. Thrinax argentea.—This beautiful palm is called the Silver Thatch palm of Jamaica, and is said to yield the leaves so extensively used in the manufacture of hats, baskets, and other articles. It is also a native of Panama, where it is called the broom palm, its leaves being there made into brooms.
414. Tillandsia zebrina.—A South American plant of the pineapple family; the bottle-like cavity at the base of the leaves will sometimes contain a pint or more of water, and has frequently furnished a grateful drink to thirsty travelers.
415. Tinospora cordifolia.—A climbing plant, so tenacious of life that when the stem is cut across or broken, a rootlet is speedily sent down from above, which continues to grow until it reaches the ground. A bitter principle, calumbine, pervades the plant. An extract called galuncha is prepared from it, considered to be a specific for the bites of poisonous insects and for ulcers. The young shoots are used as emetics.
416. Triphasia trifoliata.—A Chinese shrub, with fruit about the size of hazelnuts, red-skinned, and of an agreeable sweet taste; when green, they have a strong flavor of turpentine, and the pulp is very sticky. They are also preserved whole in sirup, and are sometimes called limeberries.
417. Tristania neriifolia.—A myrtaceous plant from Australia, called the turpentine tree, owing to its furnishing a fluid resembling that product.
418. Urceola elastica.—A plant belonging to the Apocynaceæ, a native of the islands of Borneo and Sumatra, where its milky juice, collected by making incisions in its soft, thick, rugged bark, or by cutting the trunk into junks, forms one of the kinds of caoutchouc called juitawan, but it is inferior to the South American, chiefly owing to want of care in its preparation, the milky juice being simply coagulated by mixing with salt water, instead of being gradually inspissated in layers on a mold. The fruit contains a pulp which is much eaten by the natives.