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COPPER.
431
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blesses
its tender succulence. Fortunately, too, the sense of its merits is
increasing rapidly. Not so long ago this fruit was a delicacy in the
menu of the rich man. To-day it is to be seen on the huckster's barrow
in all our large towns ; whilst we may reasonably hope that the supply
of the most wholesome, and delectable esculent will increase rapidly,
its price diminishing at the same time, so that an ample supply of the
desirable fruit thus noticed may be within the easy reach of all
persons.
Sir
Ralph Moor, a competent authority, teaches that when the banana is
really ripe, its skin has become almost black ; and it is whilst in
this condition the fruit is most fit for eating ; not when it is green
of skin, or even yellow. " The prosecutions," he says, " which are
instituted for selling bananas thus (maturely) black of aspect are
militating seriously against the industry."
Though
poorer in proteids, banana-meal is richer in carbo-hydrates than the
best wheat-flour. The natives of the West Indies, as preparatory to a
voyage, make a paste of banana fruit, when ripe, squeezing it through a
fine sieve, and then forming the pulpy paste into small loaves, which
they dry in the sun, or in hot ashes, wrapping them afterwards in
leaves of the flowering reed. When required for use, some of the paste
is mixed with sufficient water to make a thick sort of soup, which is
both pleasant of taste, and eminently nourishing. By the inhabitants of
Madeira the banana is venerated as the forbidden fruit, which may not
be cut with a knife, because, if thus treated, the fruit when bisected,
exhibits, they say, a representation of our Saviour's death on the
cross.
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