The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-09-20
MANGOES IN CUBA.
Why Our Soldiers in the Island Were
Forbidden to Eat Them.

Forbidden to Eat Them.
From the Boston Evening Transcript,
In the long list of suggestions from the
medical department., ali of which were dis
regarded, the ripe mango was recommend
ed as a desirable article of diet. But some
body at headquarters issued an edict
against it, and the soldiers were called up
by the company commanders and told that
if they ate the fruit they would be pun
ished. This ig the way the company COM
manders addressed their men:
Now, 1 see that some of you have been
eating those mangoes in spite of our ad-
vice to the contrary. Do you know what
the Cubans call this fruit? They call it
Gen. Mango because they say that the
mango has killed ~nore Spanish soldiers
than all of their generals put together If
you eat it Gen. Mango will kill you, just
as it has killed the Spaniards 1 am told
on good authority that if you eat a mango
every day and then get yellow fever you
will swell up frightfully and surely die.
Now, l give you this positive order that
not one of you shall eat any of this fruit,
and l shall punish severely any man that
disobeys the order"
After such an order the obedent regu-
lars generally let the mangoes alone, al
though they were abundant tempting and
delicious. The volunteers ate them more
freely, without any bad results, so far as
heard from. When the Cuban officers and
aides were asked their opinion as 10 the
whofesomeness of the fruit they generally
said: 1T is perfectly wholesome If eaten
ripe; all these bad things apply to the I'M
ripe mango, which is sometimes eaten by
the Spaniards." Most of the army doctors
seemed to think that the only way TO pre-
vent the eating of the unripe mango was
TO prohibit the fruit altogether There
We're many cases in which even the most
obedient regulars were impelled by thirst
and by the hunger for BIZ of fruit to dis
obey the order; and, as the clear yellow
mango is always ripe, while the unripe
fruit is green or greenish, it did not take
a very high order of Intelligence to dis
criminate between the fruit which was fit
to eat and thar which was unfit.
1t was certainly hard to believe any Ill
of mango when one looks at it, The tree
itself is a most beautiful and attractive
thing. Imagine a tree as large as a big
Massachusetts oak. covered with rich and
glossy foliage finer than that of the or
ange tree, and covered also with golden
fruit, nesting brilliantly among the green
leaves on such a tree there must be
hundred barrels of mangoes. fully matur-
ed, every one of which is as large as
good-siZed pear. In shape the mango is
not unlike short and thick cucumber
and it has a thin, tough skin, which, when
matured, reveals a mass of the most deli
cious juicy pulp. The only trouble about
eating the mango is that one needs an
ablution afterward. Some say that the
ideal way is to get into bath tub, take
the mango, eat it, and then go on with
the bath. But one is perfectly willing to
take the trouble TO seek the ablution for
the sake of the fruit And imagine the
trees which bear the fruit growing wild
everywhere, and also spring up in every
garden and dooryard; the largest and fin
est ones were away up on a wild noun
tain side. where apparently no one had
ever gathered the Astounding fruit. Nor
are they native fruit in Cuba they have
been introduced from India and simply
gone wild in the rich soil of the island.