PRICKLY PEAR.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.'] Sta,—Your correspondent " South African" has brought together some very useful and practical information about this troublesome plant, and he makes some suggestions which are well worthy of consideration. Botanically and historically, however, his remarks call for some criticism. The prickly pear and all other species of Opuntia, to give the plant its botanical name, were originally natives of the warmer parts of North and South America, being particularly abundant in Mexico, and they were unknown in the Old World prior to the discovery of that continent. It Is difficult therefore to understand the statement that " a few thousand years ago it was a popular desert food for man and beast, and that North Africa and other parts were largely dependent on this plant." Again, I think it scarcely probable that " birds, monkeys, baboons, and floods " were the agencies by which the plant spread from North to South Africa. Willingly or unwillingly, it has no doubt been spread by man's agency, and affords a striking example, with several others, of the occasionally evil results of interfering with Nature's economy. Relieved of the wholesome influence of their natural enemies which prey on them in the country of their origin, many plants and animals have run amok in new surroundings and created problems very difficult to solve. The rabbit in Australia is another example of the same thing. The prickly pear is a familiar feature in all the warmer coun- tries bordering on the Mediterranean at the present time, and from its frequency in Palestine it is often introduced by artists into representations of Biblical scenes, though, of course, it was quite unknown in the times which the artists purport to depict.
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