Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 6.djvu/123

Rh coffee its employment is yet on a very restricted scale. The following figures exhibit the ratio of increase of cocoa entered for home consumption since 1820:—

1820 267,321 ft 1830 425,382 1840 2,645,470 1850 3,080,641 1860 1870 1874 1875 4,583,124ft 6,943,102 8,863,646 9,973,926

In addition to these quantities of raw cocoa, a considerable quantity of prepared cocoa and chocolate is now imported from France. In 1820 the imports of manufactured cocoa only amounted to 14 lb, but in 1874 91,466 Bb were im ported. An import duty of Id. per lb on raw and 2d. per lb on manufactured cocoa is levied in Great Britain.  COCOA-NUT PALM (Cocos nudfera), sometimes, and perhaps more correctly, called the coco-nut palm, is a very beautiful and lofty palm-tree, growing to a height of from 60 to 100 feet, with a cylindrical stem which atta-ns a thickness of 2 feet. The tree terminates in a crown of graceful waving pinnate leaves. The leaf, which may attain to 20 feet in length, consists of a strong mid-rib, whence numerous long acute leaflets spring, giving the whole the appearance of a gigantic feather. The flowers are arranged in branching spikes 5 or 6 feet long, enclosed in a tough spathe, and the fruits mature in bunches of from 10 to 20. The fruits when mature are oblong, and triangular in cross section, measuring from 12 to 18 inches in length and 6 to 8 inches in diameter. The fruit consists of a thick external husk or rind of a fibrous structure, within which is the ordinary cocoa-nut of commerce. The nut has a very hard, woody shell, enclosing the nucleus or kernel, within which again is a milky liquid called cocoa-nut milk. The palm is so widely disseminated throughout tropical countries that it is impossible to distinguish its original habitat. It flourishes with equal vigour on the coast of the East Indies, through out the tropical islands of the Pacific, and in the West Indies and tropical America. It, however, attains its greatest luxuriance and vigour on the sea shore, and it is most at home in the innumerable small islands of the Pacific seas, of the vegetation of which it is eminently char acteristic. Its wide distribution, and its existence in even the smallest coral islets of the Pacific, have been favoured by the peculiar triangular shape of the fruit, which drop ping into the sea from trees growing on any shores would be carried by tides and currents to be cast up and to vegetate on distant coasts. {{ti|1em|The cocoa-nut palm, being the most useful of its entire tribe to the natives of the regions in which it grows, and furnishing many valuable and important commercial pro ducts, is the subject of careful cultivation in many countries. On the Malabar and Coromandel coasts of India the trees grow in vast numbers ; and in Ceylon, which is peculiarly well suited for their cultivation, it is estimated that twenty millions of the trees flourish. The wealth of a native in Ceylon is estimated by his property in cocoa-nut trees, and Sir J. Emerson Tennent notes a law case in a district court in which the subject in dispute was a claim to the 2520th part of ten of the precious palms. The cultivation of cocoa- nut plantations in Ceylon is thus described by Sir J. E. Tenuent. &quot; The first operation in cocoa-nut planting is the formation of a uurssry, for which purpose the ripe nuts are placed in squares containing about 400 each ; these are covered an inch deep with sand and sea-weed or soft mud from the beach, and watered daily till they germinate. The nuts put down in April are sufficiently grown to be planted out before the rains of September, and they are then set out in holes 3 feet deep and 20 to 30 feet apart. . . Before putting in the young plant it is customary to bed the roots with soft mud and sea-weed, and for the first {.wo years they must be watered and protected from tho glare of the suu under shades made of the plaited fronds of the cocoa-nut palm, or the fan-like leaves of the palmyra.&quot; The palm begins to bear fruit from the fifth to the seventh year of its age, each stock carrying from 5 to 30 nuts, the tree maturing on an average 60 nuts yearly.}} The uses to which the various parts of the cocoa-nut palm are applied in the regions of their growth are almost endless, The nuts supply no inconsiderable proportion of the food of the natives, and the milky juice enclosed within them forms a pleasant and refreshing drink. The juico drawn from the unexpanded flower spathes forms &quot; toddy, &quot; which may be boiled down to sugar, or it is allowed to ferment and is distilled, when it yields a spirit which, in common with a like product from other sources, is known as &quot;arrack.&quot; The trunk yields a timber (known in European commerce as porcupine wood) which is used for building, furniture, firewood, &c.; the leaves are plaited into cajan fans and baskets, and used for thatching the roofs of houses ; the shell of the nut is employed as a water vessel ; and the external husk or rind yields the coir fibre, with which are fabricated ropes, cordage, brushes, &c. The cocoa-nut palm also furnishes very important articles of external commerce, of which the principal is cocoa-nut oil. It is obtained by pressure or boiling from the kernels, which are first broken up into small pieces and dried in the sun, when they are known as copperah or copra. It is estimated that 1000 full-sized nuts will yield upwards of 500 lb of copra, from which 25 gallons of oil should be obtained. The oil is a white solid substance at ordinary temperatures, with a peculiar, rather disagreeable odour, from the volatile fatty acids it contains, and a mild taste. Under pressure it separates into a liquid and a solid portion, the latter, cocoa-stearin, being extensively used in the manufacture of candles. Cocoa-nut oil is also used in the manufacture of marine soap, which forms a lather with sea water. Coir is also an important article of commerce, being in largo demand for the manufacture of coarse brushes, door mats, and woven coir matting for lobbies and passages. A considerable quantity of fresh nuts is imported, chiefly from the West Indies, and sold as a dainty among the poorer classes, or used in the preparation of a kind of confection.  COCYTUS, a tributary of the Acheron, a river of Thesprotia, which flows into the Ionian Sea. Its modern name is the Vuvo. The name is also applied, in classical mythology, to a tributary of the Acheron, a river in Hades. The etymology suggested is from KIOKVCIV, to wail.  COD (Morrhua vulgaris), a well-known speciesof Gadidce, a family of Anacanthine Fishes, possessing, in common with the other members of the genus, three dorsal and two anal fins, and a single barbel at the chin. It is a widely distributed species, being found throughout the northern and temperate seas of Europe, Asia, and America, extending as far south as Gibraltar, but not entering the Mediter ranean, and inhabits water from 25 to 50 fathoms deep, where it always feeds close to the bottom. It is exceed ingly voracious, feeding on the smaller denizens of the ocean fish, crustaceans, worms, and moliusks, and greedily taking almost any bait the fisherman chooses to employ. The cod spawns in February, and is exceedingly prolific, the roe of a single female having been known to contain upwards of eight millions of ova, and to form more than half the weight of the entire fish. Only a small proportion of these get fertilized, and still fewer ever emerge from the egg. The number of cod is still further reduced by tho trade carried on in roe, large quantities of which are used in France as ground-bait in the sardine fishery, while it also forms an article of human food. The young are about an inch in length by the end of spring, but are not fit for the market till the second year, and it has been stated that 