Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 November 1881 — Bananas. [ARTICLE]

Bananas.

Of late years the banana trade has increased wonderfully. Formerly they were only shipped during what was termed the regular season, arriving here between May and August. But as bananas could be planted in the tropics during any month in she year, and thus grown and ripened every month, planters were induced to try the experiment, and now, as is well-known, bananas are seen on sale in our city markets, every week in the year. Unlike other tropical fruits wc get it in its perfection. It is not a whit better eaten fresh picked from the tree, than it is when brought here after having been picked green and then allowed weeks to ripen at sea and on shore. It rather improves while other tropical fruits are spoiling, and is never better than, when half blackened and looking too soft and far gone to be fit to eat, it “peels” at a touch, and leaves a delicious fruity pulp to be enjoyed deliberately. A true child of the sun, it grows on the most tropical-looking of all trees. The great, green, herbaceous trunk, looking like an exaggerated, and over-succulent corn stalk, grown into the dimensions of a moderate-sized pear tree, is crowned by its wealth of drooping and enormously long broad leaves—the whole having an expression more characteristically and self-evidently tropical than all that an ice bear expresses of polar life. The fruit grows upon the top of a trunk, which latter ranges from eight to fifteen feet in height; each fruitful stalk bearing one bunch of bananas, resembling, in position and hanging, ft sunflower in the height of its summer glory. The trees have the property of keeping the soil moist around them, and have, therefore, been planted in proximity to coffee trees in Venezuela, where long droughts occur. As that country cannot consume all the fruit, it has begun to export extensively. With so many new sources of supply, we may be quite certain that our markets will be well stocked with bananas, and at low prices during their season. They are a perishable fruit, and must be disposed of quickly; hence the advisability of low prices and ready sales.