Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 48.djvu/840

758 reticulatum), which, the natives consider sacred to Pele, the goddess who is supposed to preside over the famous crater of Kilauea; and which, together with white pigs and chickens, are thrown by them into the boiling red lake during an eruption, to appease the wrath of the aggressive dame, and thus cause the rivers of lava to cease flowing on their destructive course.

These berries grow in clusters on low bushes right on the very brink of the brimstone beds, and are so numerous that a bushel may be easily gathered in half an hour. In appearance they somewhat resemble a cranberry, and the flavor is pleasantly suggestive of grapes.

Space forbids more than passing mention of many other fruit trees of the tropics—such as the avocado, or alligator pear, tasting like our ordinary salad; the curious pineapple, with its cactuslike leaves; the mandarin orange, glowing brightly against its deep-green foliage; the cherimoya, or custard apple; the lime, the lemon, and the Japanese loquat—though they are all of great beauty and extended usefulness.



HE events of the last few months in the field of international politics, though they have been of a sufficiently disquieting character, have served at the same time to reveal the profound antagonism between the idea of war and the developed moral consciousness of the age. Rumors of war have filled the air, and, in more than one highly civilized community, popular passions have been roused to a dangerous pitch; yet, in spite of the raging of demagogues and the angry acclaims of the populace, war has not broken out. The sky has been black with thunder clouds, but the storm has not burst. To say that war between civilized nations is henceforth impossible would be to speak with singular rashness, in view of the vast and ever-increasing preparations for war which the most civilized nations have, during the last ten or twenty years, been engaged in making, and in view also of the waves of warlike sentiment which have lately swept over communities that might be supposed to be by instinct and principle most inclined to peace. At the same time it is impossible for those who abhor the thought of war not to derive hope and comfort from the fact that it seems almost impossible even now to bring the dread result about. Jingoes and other light-hearted and lightheaded persons may talk as they like; the moral difficulties to-day in the way of a war between any two very advanced countries are 