San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1888-11-12
NASSAU'S CURIOSITIES.
QUEER FRUITS, VEGETABLES, ETC.,
FURNISHED BY DAME NATURE.

b1OCCn TnOllo, NCSG No@@S' I'Sf
FURNISHED BY DAME NATURE.
Ready Made Frames for Houses-A Vege-
table Tooth Brush - Marbles Ready
Grown Lace from Bark - Vegetable
sponge-Flowers for Boot Blacking.
Nature in her all Unfolding beneficence
here has trees which form roof corner posts
and studding, only requiring clapboards to
close them in and as if realizing that fresh
circulating air is best, hints of living under
them Just as they are. The giant ceba sends
out from its base great plank like buttresses
which form stalls in which to stable cattle.
A wide spreading low branching tree--it
might be an oak except for the curious wheel
like fruit tipping the branchlets, green and
poison when young, gray and explosive
when ripe-the fruit is a capsule made up Of
deeply grooved series of nuts, fat and
round disposed on edge in a circle, clinging
to a central disk which is followed and par
titioned. when fully ripe the capsule ex-
plodes with a report like a pistol, and the
nutlets scattered far and wide, open and let
the kernels drop-a reasonable way in which
nature provides for the replanting of new
trees This fruit is called the sand box"
because i'm old Freebooter times they were
used to hold black irou ore sand, with which
writing was sanded instead of blotted. Even
aow by loading the fresh dry capsules with
lead, so as to prevent its explosion, they form
quaint paper weights This fruit is also
called the monkeys dinner bell, because
where the tree abounds in the tropics mon
keys abound also, and when they hear the ex-
plosion they hasten to dinner-its nuts" for
them
A VEGETABLE TOOTH BRUSH.
The chaw stick is a vegetable tooth brush.
The negroes here noted for fine white teeth,
and often you will see them with a piece OF
chaw stick in the mouth. The plant has
flexible stem which climbs by tendrils This
looks like licorice root This cut into six
inch lengths, the ends chewed, furnish
fbrous vegetable brush. 1T contains all arc
| matte, slightly bitter principle allied to soap
in its effect. hence chewing it, as we say of a
Cavorite dentitrice, makes the teeth clean,
the mouth sweet, the breath fragrant The
colored folks at public festivals sell small
beer of various fiavors on the street, and with
this chaw stick they give it frOtn.
The children have living fountain Of
| chewing gum trees. There is in the hospital
grounds a fine example of fcus lndica, the fig
which Yields India rubber. The leaves large,
oval thick, shining and vivid green, the
| roots spread over much surface The chill
dren scrape off little bark, the milk flows,
and they let it run over the fingers and
palms When | saw this done | thought it
would be a long job to get those hands free
from the sticky stuff But loI ON exposure
to the air few minutes, rubbing the hands
together meanwhile, the milk became dark
gray and presently peeled off and Left the
skin as clean as if washed with soap. A vast
improvement over soap and towels.
The boys find ready grown marbles, vel
low, gray and red, hiding from them in the
thickest of goulanuia, or Bonduc vines.
Each prickly pod has from one to three
''nickers," or nuts-hard, round and smooth
Necklaces, brooches and ear rings are also
formed of them.
NATURES MANY CoNvENIENCES.
To fish without labor would bruise the
root bark of Jamaica dogwood and throw it
into the water, to be sure or SUPPLYING all
the fish within its influence, without injuring
them as food This tree is common in Mas
sau--PiScIdia erythrina-and its bari is now
considerably used as an opiate in medicine
similar to that of opium For sponge |
need not go to the sea, but whip against
stone the ripe fruit of the Egyptian
ulfa, which 50 commonly here reaches It's
squash like vine into the sapUdiiIa trees. This
Shen freed from seed aHd peel gives ne
wash RAJ or vegetable Sp0Ei g,4--tOr both kit
chen or bath Bottles, bowls, JITs and cook.
ing pans grow on tresS-the cAlahash trees
Bread already leavaae!, Tut not baked,
hangs i'll great loavrS on the art0CarpuS, OF
bread fruit tree--a glnFou> picture 1t Is,
with its immense, deeply cut leaves 80
called strawberries grow like currant Clus-
ters on trees, are yellow Instead Of red and
,our instead of sweet Would you drl,k am
brusia iii for the g1Hs, Send a hlacE Hete
INTO pluiny coc0auut tree u Ting down
mt ''in the milk Sa0uld / ueeu light |
have only to rob the m,yberry OF Its green
ISL wax. or string together some nuts Of the
candle tree with cotton wIrkInS y torch of
pitch pine need be no larger thnn pencil
Would have lace A coIoir4 woman will
take gray. etu""th bi'alIcL VI tn" l-oGet-a,
and from the spread peeled barr, mOIStened
and beaten Oh Stone, unfold twenty lay
ers of white fiimk lace, as delicate ant ele-
CANT as point Would you have a dOwny
pillow. Watch till the round ovate pointed
pods of the silk cotton tree bombay cribaj
ripens and while you hold 1t III yonr hand
maybe 1t will quietly open, as it did in mine,
and out gushing comes brown, silken misty
cloud yelling up and over, falling slowly at
your feet With sigh OF surprise you won
der where or how that big basket full of silky
down could have been packed into that little
nod in yOur hand