The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1871-08-24
Vegetable Ivory.

So different are the products of the animal
from those of the vegetable kingdom, that even
the most careless observer may be expected at
once to distinguish them. Yet multitudes arc
in the daily use of ivory buttons, boxes and
small ornaments, who never doubt that they
are made from the tusks of the elephant, while
they are really the product of plant.
The ivory plant is native OF the northern
regions of South America, extending north
wards just across the 1sthmus of Panama, Large
groves of it having been recently discovered in
the province of that name. 1t is found in ex-
tensive groves-in which it banishes all other
vegetation from the soil it has taken posses
sion of-or scattered among the large trees Of
the virgin forests.
1t has the appearance of a stemlcss palm,
and consists of a graceful crown of leaves twen-
ty feet long, of delicate pale green color, and
divided like the plume of Il feather into from
thirty to fifty pairs of long, narrow leaf
lets. 1t is not, however, really stemless, but
the weight of the foliage and the fruit is too
much for the comparatively slender trunk, and
consequently pulls it down to the ground,
where it is seen like large exposed root,
stretching for q length of nearly twenty feet
in old plants. The long leaves are employed
by the Indians to cover the roofs of their cot
tages. Each flower of the ivory plant does not
contain stamcns and pistils, us in most of the
British plants, but, like our willows, one tree
produces only staminal flowers, while another
has only pistillatc ones. Such plants are said
by botanists to be diGcious. Both kinds OF the
plants of the vegetable ivory have the same
general appearance, and differ only IN the lorm
and ARRANGEMENT of the flowers. In the one
kind an innumcrablc quantity of staminal flow
ers is borne on cylindrical flcshy axis, four
foot long, while in the other few pistilate
flowers spring from the end of the flowerstalk.
Each plant bears several heads of flowers
Purdie, who visited the plants in their native
locality in 1916, says: 'The fragrance OF the
flowers is most powerful, and delicious beyond
that Of any other plant; and diilllse, that the
air for many yards around was alive with my
rialls of annoying insects, which first attracted
nv notice. | had afterwards to carry the flow
crs in my hands for II miles, and though y
killed number of insects that followed mel
the next day great many still lowered about
them, which had come along with us from tine
wood where the plants grew"
The group of pistillato flowers produces
large roundish fruit from eight to twelve inche
in diameter, and weighing when ripe abot
twenty-five pounds. 1t is covered by Il had
woody coat, everywhere embossed with coh-
cal angular tubcrclcs, and is composed OF Ok
or seven portions, each containing from slIto
nine seeds. These seeds, when ripe, are ,pre
white free from veins, dots or vessels ofmy
kind, presenting perfect uniformity of sx-
turc surprising the finest animal ivory; aia Its
substance is throughout so hard, that the sight
est strcaks from the turning lathe are obsava-
bic. Indeed, it looks much more like auani-
mai than vegetable product; but a.closc
comparison will enable one to distinguish it
from the ivory of tue elephant, by its hight