Papaw

“ The papaw has the family name, custard-apple, from its unusual fruit, whose flesh is soft and yellow, like custard. The shape suggests that of a banana. The fruits hang in clusters and their pulp is enclosed in thick dark brown skin, wrinkled, sometimes shapeless, three to five inches long. Dead ripe, the flesh becomes almost transparent, fragrant, sweet, rather insipid, surrounding flat, wrinkled seeds an inch long. The fruit is gathered and sold in local markets from forests of these papaws which grow under taller trees in the alluvial bottom lands of the Mississippi Valley. ”

“ These birds are excellent eating when not too fat; but when the papaws are ripe they become grossly unwieldy, and the whole body is covered with thick yellow fat, and the flesh has the strong sweet taste of the papaw. At this time, so the natives say, they are actually unable to rise for flight, and are easily captured by the women and children at work in the banana and taro plantations. ”

“ Each is singular from the fact that it represents wholesome food long before arrival at maturity.
Then as a medicine plant the papaw is of great renown. The peculiar properties of the milky juice which exudes from every part of the plant were noticed two hundred years ago. The active principle of the juice known as papain, said to be capable of digesting two hundred times its weight of fibrine, is used for many disorders and ailments, from dyspepsia to ringworm and ichthyosis or fish-skin disease.
By common repute the papaw tree has the power of rendering tough meat tender. ”

“ The branch, among the foliage of which you see the male and female winging their way, is one of the Papaw, a tree of small size, seldom more than from twenty to thirty feet in height, with a diameter of from three to seven inches. It is found growing in all rich grounds, to which it is peculiar, from the southern line of our States to central Pennsylvania, seldom farther eastward, here and there only along the alluvial shores of the Ohio and Mississippi. In all other places of like nature you may meet with groves of Papaw trees, covering an acre or more of ground. ”

“ The papaw is a large herbaceous plant rather than a tree. It has a sort of juicy trunk terminated by a tuft of leaves, and the fruit, which is like a melon, hangs down under the leaves.1464 It is now grown in all tropical countries, even as far as thirty to thirty-two degrees of latitude. It is easily naturalized outside plantations. This is one reason why it has been said, and people still say that it is a native of Asia or of Africa, whereas Robert Brown and I proved in 1848 and 1855 its American origin.1465 I repeat the arguments against its supposed origin in the eastern hemisphere. ”

“ The sonnets in this collection are rather poems in fourteen lines than sonnets.
Page 119.
The slim papaya ripens, etc.
Papaya—papaw, custard-apple. Flint, in his excellent work on the Geography and History of the Western States, thus describes this tree and its fruit:
"A papaw-shrub hanging full of fruits, of a size and weight so disproportioned to the stem, and from under long and rich-looking leaves, of the same yellow with the ripened fruit, and of an African luxuriance of growth, is to us one of the richest spectacles that we have ever contemplated in the array of the woods. ”

“ A good mulch of decomposed vegetable matter round the plants is an advantage, but they are usually so easily grown that little extra care is given to them. The papaw bears male and female flowers, which may be on the same trees, but are usually on different trees, so that it is usual to speak of male and female trees. ”

“ The fruit of several species of Passiflora (passion-fruit) is valued on account of the cooling and refreshing pulp surrounding the seeds; the large-fruited kind, known as grenadilla, being specially prized. The very different-looking papaw is now everywhere cultivated in the tropics for its large fruit, which, though insipid, is cooling and antiseptic. ”

“ The papaw fruit resembles a rock melon somewhat in shape and flavour, the fruit being produced in the axil of the leaves all along the main stem, where they are clustered thickly together. The tree does best on well-drained soils, and is very sensitive to the presence of clay or stagnant water at the roots, hence it usually does best on scrub land or land well supplied with humus. ”

“ Only those who grow it themselves, who learn of the relative merits of the produce of different trees, and who can time their acceptance of it from the tree, so that it shall possess all its fleeting elements in the happy blending of full maturity, can know how good and great papaw really is. The fruit of some particular tree is of course not to be tolerated save as a vegetable, and then what a desirable vegetable it is? It has a precise and particular flavour, and texture most agreeable. And as a mere fruit there are many more rich and luscious, and highly-flavoured ”

“ It has been said that they have taken their black, brown, and olive and yellow skin tints from the satiny and bright-hued rinds of the fruit which surround them. If they are to be believed, the mystery of their clean, clear complexion and exquisite pulp-like flesh arises from the use of the papaw fruit as a cosmetic. A slice of ripe fruit is rubbed over the skin, and is said to dissolve spare flesh and remove every blemish. It is a toilet requisite in use by the young and old, producing the most beautiful specimens of the human race. ”

“ The tree is, as a rule, unbranched, and somewhat palm-like in form. Its great leaves, often a foot and a half long, borne on smooth, cylindrical stalks, are curiously cut into seven lobes, and the stem is hollow and transversely partitioned with thin membranes.
One of the most remarkable characteristics of the papaw is that it is polygamous—that is to say, there may be male and female and even hermaphrodite flowers on the same plant. Commonly the plants are classed as male and female. The males largely predominate. ”

“ The apple, they say, too, gives to the face of the fair ruddiness, but the tint is it not too bold, compared with maiden blush which bepaints the cheek of the beauty who rightly understands the use of the vital principle of the papaw? Those who have complexions to retain or restore let them understand and be fair. ”

“ The seeds used as a thirst-quencher form component parts of a drink welcome to fever patients. The papaw and the banana in conjunction form an absolutely perfect diet. What the one lacks in nutritive or assimilative qualities the other supplies. No other food, it is asserted is essential to maintain a man in perfect health and vigour. Our fictitious appetites may pine for wheaten bread, oatmeal, flesh, fish, eggs, and all manner of vegetables but given the papaw and the banana, the rest are superfluous. Where the banana grows the papaw flourishes. ”

“ In the yard of a house in Hartford, belonging to the widow of a high school classmate of mine, I found a number of papaw trees, some of them as big as they often grow, perhaps forty feet high and up to a foot in diameter. ”

“ A vine, belonging to the natural order Passifloreæ, that produces one of our most delicious tropical fruits. The papaw and the passion fruit belong to this same order. It can be grown all along our eastern seaboard, but comes to greatest perfection in the North. The fruit is of a pale greenish-yellow colour, cylindrical in shape, and varies in weight from about 1 to 5 lb., the largest fruits being produced on a sub-species. The fruit consists of an outer pulpy covering, which can be used for cooking if desired, which surrounds a cavity filled with seeds which are encased in a jelly-like mass. ”

“ When you have eaten of a papaw in its prime, one that has grown without check or hindrance, and has been removed from the tree without bruise or blemish, you have within you pure, good and chaste food, and you should be thankful and of a gladsome mind. ”

“ The papaw [393] is abundantly cultivated, and its great gourd-like fruit is eaten (called “Papita” or “Chinaman”) ; the flavour is that of a bad melon, and a white juice exudes from the rind. The Hodgsonia heteroclita (Trichosanthes of Roxburgh) , a magnificent Cucurbitaceous climber, grows in these forests; it is the same species as the Sikkim one (see p. 7) . The long stem bleeds copiously when cut, and like almost all woody climbers, is full of large vessels; the juice does not, however, exude from these great tubes, which hold air, but from the close woody fibres. ”

“ The papaw apples grow in clusters on stalks, but each of them, when full-grown, is larger than the largest-sized English apple, some nearly as large as a good-sized musk melon, and have nearly the same look. When half-ripe, they are used as a vegetable, and boiled, are a good substitute for turnips; when full-ripe, they are a great antidote to worms, and are recommended to persons afflicted with them: the seeds of the apple especially, which have a hot quality, like pepper, are reckoned good in that disorder. ”

“ In their hunting parties they have always some stout dogs with them; but, he said, it was common for one man to {122} go alone, but never without dogs. Here I tasted the ripe fruit of the pawpaw or papaw, an extremely rich fruit, in flavour something like a pine-apple. I did not relish it; this they told me was often the case at first tasting it, but when accustomed to it people were fond of it. We did not see any more of these trees on the Ohio, but my son and Mr. C. saw a great many of them on the Wabash, in their voyage up that river. ”

“ The mild Hindoo, however, who has cultivated the papaw (or papai to adopt the Anglo-Indian title) for centuries, and likewise wishes to avoid the cultivation of unprofitable male plants, seeks by ceremonies to counteract the bias of the plant in favour of masculine attributes. Without the instigation or knowledge of man or boy, a maiden, pure and undefiled, takes a ripe fruit from a tree at a certain phase of the moon, and plants the seed in accordance with more or less elaborate ritual. The belief prevails that these observances procure an overwhelming majority of the female element. ”

“ The bark of this tree is silvery white—a striking contrast with the lustrous head of foliage. The flowers are waxy, tubular, fragrant, turning their yellow petals backward in a whorl. On fertile [Pg 170] trees the fruits mature into great melons, sometimes as large as a man's head; but these are the cultivated varieties. Wild papaws rarely exceed four inches long, and usually they are smaller. When full grown the fruit turns to bright orange-yellow. The succulent pulp separates easily from the round seeds. ”

“ In North Queensland the plant grows everywhere. In the dry, buoyant climate west of the coast range, and in the steamy coastal tract, on cliff-like hill-sides, on sandy beaches a few feet above high-water mark, among rocks with but a few inches of soil, and where the decayed vegetation of generations has made fat mould many feet deep, the papaw flourishes. It asks foothold, heat, light and moisture, and given these conditions a plant within a few months of its first start in life will begin to provide food—entertaining, refreshing, salubrious—and will continue so to do for years. ”

“ Where conditions of life are not too severe, it may be used for shade tree planting.
41 PAPAW Asimina triloba Dunal
THE papaw, which grows as a small tree or large shrub, is very well known throughout the State, except in the northern parts, and is sometimes called the “wild banana” tree. Most commonly it occurs as an undergrowth in the shade of rich forests of the larger hardwood trees. ”

“ In the country in which it is supposed to be endemic it is believed that if male animals graze under the papaw tree they become BLASE; but science alleges that the roots and extracted juice possess aphrodisiac properties, and who among us would not rather place credence upon this particular fairy tale of science than the fairy tales of swarthy and illiterate and possibly biassed gentlemen. ”

“ At eleven o'clock we halted, and as our provisions were nearly exhausted, most of the party went out to [33] hunt, but were not fortunate in meeting game. We found, however, some papaw trees with ripe fruit of an uncommon size and delicious flavor, with which we were able to allay our hunger. ”

“ Anthers adnate, opening outward; filaments very short. Pistils several or many, separate or cohering in a mass, fleshy or pulpy in fruit. Seeds anatropous, large, with a crustaceous seed-coat, and a minute embryo at the base of the ruminated albumen.—Leaves alternate, entire, feather-veined. Flowers axillary, solitary.—A tropical family, excepting the following genus:—
1. ASÍMINA, Adans. North American Papaw.
Petals 6, increasing after the bud opens; the outer set larger than the inner. ”

“ You may taste this goblin{176}land muskmelon if you will and still not entirely lose the idea, though it is to me something like eating a muskmelon in a bad dream. There are people who say they like papaws, and that if you take them at just the right period of their ripeness and eat them muskmelon-wise with sugar and a spoon you will hardly know the difference. Such people may have all the papaws that have thus far been reserved for me.
Well out in the pine barrens, I find another shrub which is a close relative of the papaw, the custard apple. ”

“ The fresh milky juice of the Papaw has been successfully employed in the treatment of Worms, especially the common Round Worm or Lumbricus. The juice should be collected as it flows out from incisions made in the unripe fruit; a table-spoonful suffices for a dose for an adult. It should, whilst quite fresh, be mixed with an equal quantity of honey and two ounces of boiling water, and the whole well stirred. When cool, this should be taken as a draught, and two hours subsequently, one ounce of Castor Oil, with half a table-spoonful of Lime Juice. ”