About the month of September, not long after the blossoms are fallen, the berries are gathered by the hand; one laborer on the tree, employed in gathering the small branches, will give employment to three below (who are generally women and children) in picking the berries. They are then spread out thinly, and exposed to the sun at its rising and setting for some days; when they begin to dry, they are frequently winnowed, and laid on cloths to preserve them better from rain and dew; by this management they become wrinkled, and change from green to a deep reddish brown color. Great quantities are annually imported. What are its uses? It forms a pleasant addition to flavor food; it also yields an agreeable essential oil, and is accounted the best and mildest of common spices. _Essential_, pure; extracted so as to contain all the virtues of the spice in a very small compass. Why is it called Allspice? Because it has been supposed to combine the flavor of cloves, nutmegs, and cinnamon; the French call it _round clove_, from its round shape, and the taste being somewhat like that spice. What is Pepper? The product of a creeping shrub, growing in several parts of the East Indies, Asia, and America. In what manner does Pepper grow, and what part of the shrub is used? Pepper is the fruit of this shrub, and grows in bunches or clusters, at first green; as it ripens it becomes reddish, until having been exposed for some time to the heat of the sun, (or probably gathered before perfectly ripe,) it becomes black, as in the condition we have it. There are two sorts, the black and the white. What is the White Pepper? The white pepper is merely the black deprived of its outside skin. For this purpose the finest red berries are selected, and put in baskets to steep, either in running water, or in pits dug for the purpose, near the banks of rivers. Sometimes they are only buried in the ground. In any of these situations, they swell and burst their skins, from which, when dry, they are carefully separated by rubbing between the hands, or fanning. What is Cayenne Pepper? The dried fruit of a plant called bird pepper, a native of both Indies. It is more pungent than the other sorts. CHAPTER VII. GLASS, MIRRORS, EARTHENWARE, PORCELAIN, NEEDLES, PINS, PAPER, PRINTING, PARCHMENT, AND VELLUM. What is Glass? A transparent, solid, brittle, factitious body, produced by fusing sand with an alkali. The essential ingredients of glass are silex and potash, or soda; a few other substances are sometimes added. Silex is found nearly pure in rock crystal, flint, and other varieties of quartz; for the manufacture of the better kinds of glass in this country, it is generally obtained from sand, especially the white sand of New Jersey. _Factitious_, made by art, not found in a state of nature. What is Potash?