Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1906-10-19
THE LEMON SUPPLY.
Where II Comes From-how the Val
uahie Essence is Obtained.

uabie Essence u SptaiHoo'
Lemons have become quite domes-
tic question" The housewife Is dis
covering that lemons are scarce and
dear. The explanation Of the shortage
is a simple one. This has been rec
ord summer for the use Of lemons, and
the supply has not equalled the de-
mand; prices have gone up and the end
of the summer finds a great inroad
made into the autumn stock.
Our lemon supplies are mostly guar
anteed by Sicilian summers, says the
London Daily Mail. The Messina and
Palermo crops begin in November and
sometimes last through the whole
year. so that the same ship may bring
the last cases of the old crop and the
first of the new. But this has been q
lemon summer, and so the last ship
ments from Cicily did not provide
more than enough to meet the August
heat wave. Next to Cicily we depend
upon Naples and the Neapolitan crop,
which begins In the early spring, usu-
again, Neapolitan lemons have lasted
only until the beginning Of September.
Then comes sunny Spain, with Malaga,
Murcia and Carthagena lemons, and
the groves Of Lisbon practically COM
plete the tale Of our supplies.
California has, during the last thirty
years, supplied some portion Of the
American demand, but the United
States in not Independent Of the lem
on groves of Europe, and 1t Is the
largest consumer of European lem
ons, with Great Britain good second.
The confectioners take their share,
though most of their supplies come in
the form Of picked rinds and citrate
of lime. The Messina lemons. having
the most acidity, are the best for the
purposes Of the manufacture Of citrate
of lime, and 1t Is in Messina that the
lemons whose products are wanted by
the confectioners are dealt with.
The pulp is there turned into pow
dered citrate of lime, as 1t Is more con-
venient to export than the concen-
trated lemon juice from which the
manufacturers here derive their citrate
of lime; and the rinds are put In brine
and sent over to England to be turn
ed into that adjunct of Christmas
cheer, candied peel.
The essence of lemon Is squeezed
out of the peel by hand. Sicilian girls
stand with a pile Of peel cut into quar-
ters at their side and before them is a
sponge. That is all their apparatus.
They squeeze each quarter Of the rind
and a jet of essence issues forth and
is soaked up by the sponge. Then the
sponge is squeezed and the costly es-
sence is bottled but thousands Of lem
ons are necessary to fill tiny vial.
The lemon tree Is a frail plant and
not so hardy as the orange. 1t Is so
used to the genial kindness of the sun
that q nip Of frost Is fatal to 1t. One
hour of frost on January 30 last year
almost destroyed the Neapolitan crop,
and though many Of the trees recover
ed enough strength to put forth fresh
leaves this year they had not the
strength to bear fruit, but by having
rested they will be all the better next
year. so that the crop Of 1907 may be
expected to reach high level of abun-
dance and quality. Last year too, the
fragrant lemon groves Of the French
Riviera were "untimely nipped In the
bud" The valleys showed the black
and leafiess skeletons of trees that
should have been in leaf and blossom
and many of them, shriveled past re-
covery, had to be uprooted.
The Neapolitan lemons are the fin
est Of all and come when they are most
wanted when other crops are over. But
artifice and not nature regulates their
maturity. In certain districts in Italy,
particularly in Majori, they are grown
on estates which once belonged, and
some of which still belong, to the an
cient nobility Of the land who in rest
less political times lived on their es-
tates outside the city and cultivated
lemon groves as part Of the elegancies
Of their pleasure gardens.
Here the trees are not allowed to
grow beyond six or seven feet in height
and the ripening of the fruit is artifi-
cially retarded by the trees being COW
cred with rushes supported on pipes,
so that when they ought naturally to
be ripe they are still immature and
the terraces where they grow are cool
and dark even in the sunny days Of
early summer But in May the rushes
are thrown aside and the sun pours
down on the trees to ripen the fruit
just at the time when the English and
American summer demand Is at Its
height. Thus the Naples lemons es-
cape the dangers of a glut and fetch
highest prices when fresh lemons are
most wanted.
Santos -Dumont's Bagatelle.
Bagatelle is the name of M. Santos
IL WN