In both species, known as _Vanilla pompona_ and _Vanilla planifolia_, the orchid has flat leaves and a fleshy climbing stem that hugs tree trunks or other supports, always in the dense shade of the tropical forests. It needs a hot moist climate, but if there be too much rain as the pods are ripening they drop off, so that only certain localities are suited to its cultivation. Various islands are apparently better suited to the plant than the mainland, Tahiti producing alone nearly half the world’s supply. The species most cultivated is _Vanilla planifolia_, which came originally from southern Mexico, where considerable plantations are still maintained. The pods are about as thick as a thumb or finger and from five to seven inches long, and yellow when ripe. The ripening process takes several months and when completed the pod is still without the delicious fragrance for which it is famous. Curing by dipping in boiling water or by fermentation, a very delicate process requiring long experience, brings out the flavor. In some regions the pods are plunged into ashes and left there until they begin to shrivel when they are cleaned off, rubbed with olive oil, and tied at their lower end to prevent splitting. Still another process demanding that the pods be plunged in rum is followed, but only in limited degree, owing to the expense. In all of them the result is the same--that of inducing chemical changes in the pod which are responsible for its subsequent flavor. NUTMEG [Illustration: FIG. 104.--NUTMEG (_Myristica fragrans_) A native of southeastern tropical Asia. The fruit, somewhat enlarged here, consists of an inner part, the nutmeg. Around this is a “splendid crimson network” which is removed by hand and forms the mace of commerce.] A small tree of the tropical regions of eastern Asia, known as _Myristica fragrans_, or perhaps better as _Myristica moschata_, is the source of both nutmeg and mace which come from different parts of the same plant. The genus contains over one hundred species, belongs to the _Myristicaceæ_, and is scattered all over the Malayan region. Almost none of its relatives, however, have the fragrance of the nutmeg and none is used as a spice. Both nutmeg and mace have been known in Europe only from about 1195 A.D., when in a poem about the entry of the Emperor Henry VI into Rome, the streets were described as being perfumed by the burning of nutmegs and other fragrant plants. It was not until the rise of the Dutch, who burned large stores of it at Amsterdam in 1790 in order to keep up a falling price, that nutmegs came into general use. The trees are now chiefly cultivated in the Dutch East Indies, a small fraction of the supply coming from the West Indies, which is alleged to be an inferior product.