I do not
suppose there is a boy or girl in England or America that has not eaten
the fruit of the Arabian palm tree; but how many of you know the taste of
sugar-cane?

In many parts of Arabia, especially at Busrah and along the river Tigris,
you can see the sugar-cane sellers sit by the wayside and dispose of this
Arabian stick-candy to the boys and girls in exchange for coppers. The
woman in the picture has chosen the shelter of a date tree and beside the
tall bundles of cane she has oranges for sale as well. The sugar-cane is
cut into pieces and sold "by the knot"; that is, by the length of the
stick from one knot to the next. It is not expensive and I have seen even
the very poorest children suck their cane on the way home as happy as
sugar can make them. The sugar-cane is a kind of grass but it grows to
twice the height of a boy and is over two inches in circumference. The
stems are smooth, shining and hard on the outside, but inside they are
porous and the pores are full of sugar sap. The sugar-cane first came from
India, but the Arabs spread its cultivation as far as Morocco and Sicily;
so that it is no wonder that the word "sugar" itself comes from the
Arabic. Yet it shows how ignorant the Arabs are to-day because, although
they have sugar-cane, _their_ sugar nearly all comes from Europe. They do
not know how to manufacture it and therefore eat the sugar-cane raw.

[Illustration: WOMAN SELLING SUGAR-CANE.]

Sweeter than sugar-cane and much more plentiful is the date. There is no
place in all Arabia where you do not see the date palm growing, and seldom
can you eat a meal in any part of the country but dates are part of the
bill-of-fare. In fact thousands of people in Arabia have nothing but dates
to eat from January to December! So plentiful are they that even donkeys
and camels are fed on dates in some districts.

Many of the dates you buy in your own country come from Arabia. On the
best kind of dates which come in wooden boxes you will find Muscat or
Busrah stamped to show from what place they were shipped. There are very
many kinds of dates in Arabia, and only a very few sorts are sent abroad.
Some of them are too delicate to stand the long voyage and others are
found only in small quantities. I do not think any of the dates that reach
America equal those we pick from the palm tree ourselves here in
Arabia--no more than dried apple rings taste as good as ripe juicy sweet
apples from the orchard. When the