The Vanilla Plant.
Vanilla.
A climbing plant, native of America. If grows to thirty feet or more in length, but the stalk is slender and weak, and climbs upon trees to support it. It is round, striated, green, and tough. The leaves are numerous and placed irregularly; they are a foot long, considerably broad, and like those of the common plantain, of a dusky green, and have high ribs. The flowers are small in shape like a pea blossom, but of a greenish white colour. The pods are long and flatted, of a brown colour, of a very fragrant smell, and full of exceedingly small seeds.
This pod is the part used; it is a cordial and restorative; it opens obstructions, and promotes the menses; it operates by urine, and by sweat, but it is not much used. Some put them into chocolate, to give it a flavour, and to make it more cordial and restorative; this is done in the grinding up the nuts to the cake, and we buy it by the name of Vanilla chocolate.
