Letters from Alabama: Chiefly Relating to Natural History

Letter VI

Letter VI July 1st You must not expect from me anything like a continuous narrative. “Story! why, bless you, I have none to tell, Sir!” My observations are slight and disjointed; peeps through Nature’s keyhole at her recondite mysteries;—“passages in the life of a spider;”—“unpublished memoirs of a beetle;”—“notes of the ­ domestic economy of a fly:”—and you must take them for so much as they are worth. The Indian Corn (Zea mays) is in all its glory; few plants have a more noble appearance than the variety of maize cultivated here; the northern corn is a pigmy to it. It grows to the height of ten feet; the stem strong and thick, surrounded and partially enveloped in its large flag-­ like leaves, here and there the swelling ears projecting from the stalk, each enclosed in its membranous sheath, from the extremity of which the pendulous shining filaments hang out, called the silk, and which are the pistils of the female flowers; and the tall elegant spike of male flowers, called the tassel, crowns the whole. The full-­ ripe ears are of­ten nearly a foot in length, and seven or eight inches in circumference; the grains are very closely set, and in growing pinch each other up into a square form; the cob, or pithy placenta, which remains after the grains have been shelled off, is as large as a full ear of the northern corn. It is now in that agreeable condition alreadyalludedto ,called“roasting-­ear;”thegrainsbeingformed,butyetquitesoft and pulpy. Some now go into field and gather the ears, and bite off the grains while raw, when they have a sugary taste; but they are more commonly used as a culinary vegetable, roasted at the fire, or boiled and shelled like peas, and eaten with melted butter. It is considered a delicacy; but as the ripening corn rapidly hardens, it lasts only a few days. Not only squirrels, but rabbits, bears, and many other wild animals, have a similar taste for roasting-­ ears, and do not scruple to indulge their partiality at the farmer’s expense. Corn is almost the only bread-­ stuff raised here, the wheaten flour used being imported chiefly from the north. Cotton and corn divide the plantations. The steep banks of many of the winding creeks and branches are densely clothed, for considerable portions of their darkling course, with tall canes (Miega macrosperma). When the country was first settled, the cane-­ brakes were much Letters from Alabama 119 more extensive, and only penetrable by means of the axe. But many of them have been cut down; and the depredations of the cattle, which are very fond of the plant, eating off the tender and succulent shoots, keep down its growth, and prevent its attaining anything like the height and size which formerly characterised it. The whole plant has the appearance of a gigantic grass, with long, narrow , spear-­ shaped leaves, of a beautiful green, crowned with a bunch of seedy-­ looking flowers like those of a rush; the stalk or cane, when growing, is straight, green, and pliable; but, after being cut, soon becomes bright yellow, and, though elastic, acquires hardness and firmness, and makes nice walking-­sticks, fishing-­ rods, &c. I have pressed these canes into the service of entomology, by cutting those of suitable size and length, and after drying them a few days, using them as handles for my butterfly-­net, for which their lightness and strength make them very fit. It is said that when cane has been cut, and is so dry that it will burn, it is a holiday amusement of the negroes to set fire to a cane-­ brake thus prepared. The rarefied air in the hollow compartments of the cane bursts them with a report not much inferior to a discharge of musketry; and the burning of a cane-­ brake makes a noise as of a conflicting army, in which thousands of muskets are continually discharged. It rises from the ground like the richest asparagus, with a large succulent stem; and it grows six feet high before this succulency and tender­ ness harden into wood. When five years old, it shoots up its fine head of seed, like that of broom-­corn; the seeds are large and farinaceous, and were used by the Indians as bread-­corn. Insimilarsitua­tionsanotherplantisnumerous,whichgivesastillmoretropi­ cal air to the landscape: I allude to the common Fan-­ palm (Chamaerops serru­ lata). It grows in the form of a low bush...