Bory de St. Vincent,[160] in his _Essais sur les Isles Fortunées_, an entertaining description of the archipelago of the Canaries, says that in Fer, one of the Canary Islands, a nearly total privation of running water was compensated by an extraordinary tree. Bacon (_Nov. Scient. Org._, 412), the Father Taillandier (_Lettr. Edit._, vii., 280), Corneille (_Grand Dict._, under _Fer_) may be consulted about this tree, called the holy one. Gonzalez d’Oviedo (ii., 9) says it distils water through its trunk, branches, and leaves, which resemble so many fountains. The “exaggerator Jakson,” says Bory de St. Vincent, being at Fer in 1618, saw this tree dried up during the day, but at night yielding enough water to supply the thirst of 8,000 inhabitants and 100,000 other animals. According to this authority, it was distributed from time immemorial all over the island by pipes of lead. It is nothing to “Jakson” that lead was not known from time immemorial. Viana (_Cant._, i.) speaks of the sacred tree as a sort of celestial pump.[161] Another author says the holy tree was called _Garoe_, and that its fruit resembled an acorn, that its leaves were evergreen, and like those of a laurel. During an east wind the water harvest was the most abundant. This celebrated vegetable product was unfortunately destroyed by a hurricane in 1625. But even about this date authors disagree. While Nunez de la Pena is an authority for that given, Nieremberg assures us the catastrophe occurred in 1629. Another date mentioned is 1612. The view of Bory de St. Vincent is that this holy tree was nothing more than the _Laurus Indica_ of Linnæus, which is indigenous to the mountain summits of the Canary Islands. His concluding remark is pregnant with common sense: _Si les auteurs que nous ont parlé du Garoé ont dit qu’il était seul de son espèce dans l’île, c’est qu’ils n’étaient pas botanistes, et qu’ils n’avaient pas réfléchi que cet arbre ayant un fruit, devait se reproduire, comme tous les autres végétaux._ The water of rivers is often clarified in a peculiar manner before drinking. For instance, that of the Ganges is said to be improved by rubbing certain nuts on the edges of the vessel in which it is kept,[162] though how this may be it is as difficult to understand, as how the turtle is affected by a touch of his carapace, or the Dean and Chapter—to borrow Sydney Smith’s illustration—of St. Paul’s by stroking the cupola of that cathedral. The Nile water is also said to be purified by treating the vessel which holds it in a similar manner to that which holds the water of the Ganges, with bitter almonds. The bitter waters of Marah were made sweet in a far different fashion.