Here is a negro gathering cocoanuts. Let us watch him. He climbs the
tall tree, dragging a rope after him. About his waist is a belt in which
is thrust a machete.
He hacks off a bunch of the nuts and attaches it to the end of the rope.
It is then lowered to another negro or to the ground. The nuts are in
bunches of a dozen or two, and are covered with a green, smooth, shining
covering.
After the bunches of nuts are all removed from the tree, the climber
throws down the rope and comes down hand over hand.
These nuts are so large that a single one often yields two glasses of
milk.
We found that the natives made boats and furniture, as well as houses,
from the trunk of this palm tree. They extract from its roots a remedy
for fever. The foot stalks of the leaves are made into combs. The leaves
are used for thatching huts and in making baskets, mats and hats.
The fibrous material at the base of the foot stalks is used for sieves,
and woven into clothing. A medicine is made from the flowers, and from
the flower-stalks palm wine is made. From the juice is made sugar and
vinegar. From the fruit or nut, water, jelly and meat are obtained. Oil
is extracted from the kernel; and the refuse is used for food for fowls
and cattle, as well as for manure.
From the husks ropes, brooms, brushes, and bedding are made. The shells
are used as lamps, cups, spoons, and scoops.
It has been called the poor man's tree because it gives him food, drink,
medicine and material with which to build his home.
The tropics could not do without the palm. It is more to that region
than the pine is to the north.
THE CALABASH TREE.
Another very useful tree to the natives is the calabash, or gourd tree.
It provides him with many household utensils. In height and size it
resembles an apple tree. Its leaves are wedge-shaped and its flowers are
large, whitish and fleshy.
The fruit is something like a gourd and often a foot in diameter. The
shell of the fruit is so hard that it is not easily broken by rough
usage or burnt by exposure to fire. It is used instead of bottles, cups,
basins, dishes, pots and kettles, and to make musical instruments.
Sometimes the calabashes are polished, carved, dyed or otherwise
ornamented. The pulp of the fruit is used as a medicine.
THE TRAVELER'S TREE.
One of the most curious and beautiful trees on the island is the
traveler's tree. It is so named because it contains in its leaves and at
their bases a large quantity of pure water.
By piercing the leaves with a spear or pike the water is drawn out, and
found cool and refreshing. It often relieves the thirst of the traveler
in this warm country.
BREAD FRUIT.
Among the fruit products used in large quantities are the bread-fruit
and bread-nuts. These trees grow very large and have wide-spreading
branches about fifty feet from the ground.
The leaves are, very broad, and the fruit looks something like an ovoid
osage orange as large as one's head.
[Illustration: BREADFRUIT.]
The fruit is best when picked green, and baked in an oven or in the
ashes, after paring away the outer skin or rind. When done it resembles
a browned loaf of bread. It is very good and, wholesome, too; but it
tastes more like baked plantain than bread.
The bread-nuts look on the outside like the bread-fruit, but the inside
contains a great mass of closely packed nuts like large chestnuts. These
are not good raw, but are fine when baked or boiled.
ANNOTTO.
We have often heard people speak of butter and cheese being colored, but
did not know that the dairyman was obliged to send to the West Indies
for his dye. The bush which provides it is called the annotto or
annatto. It grows to the size of the quince tree. The leaves are
heart-shaped; and the rosy flowers are followed by fuzzy red-and-yellow
pods, something like chestnut burs.
These small burs are filled with a crimson pulp containing many seeds.
This pulp is immersed in water a few weeks, strained and boiled to a
paste. The paste is made into cakes and dried in the sun. Then it comes
to our country and appears upon our tables in butter or cheese.
Can you tell me where bay rum comes from? We have often wondered, and
find here an answer to the question. It is furnished by the bay tree,
which grows here. The leaves are distilled and the oil extracted from
them to furnish this perfume for the bath.
SPICES.
Spices, in some form, are served every day upon our table; yet few of us
know where they come from, or where, how, or upon what they grow.
We have heard of the Spice Islands, perhaps, and we just take it for
granted that they all grow there. We are very much surprised, then, to
find many of the spices in Puerto Rico.
ALLSPICE, OR PIMENTO.
The pimento spice is native to this soil. The groves of these trees are
beautiful. The trees grow to a height of thirty feet, their stems are
smooth and clean, and their leaves glossy.
[Illustration: BRANCH AND BUD OF PIMENTO (ALL-SPICE).]
The trees bear fruit when about seven years old. The berries are
gathered green and dried in the sun. The branches to which the berries
are attached are broken off by boys and thrown to girls and women, who
pick off the berries, and take them to the drying places.
