CAPER (Fr. capre, Lat. eapparis, Gk. lair rapa, kapparis). The pickled flower-bud of the caper-bush (rapparis spinosa). It has an agree able pungency of taste, with a slight bitterness, and has long been in very general use as a condi ment and ingredient of sauces. It possesses medicinal properties, being an antiscorbutic, stimulant, and laxative. It is of a grayish green color, to improve which copper is some times used. The caper-bush is a native of the Mediterranean countries. It is extensively cul tivated in some parts of the south of France and in Italy, hut most of all in Sicily. It succeeds in the open air even at Paris, but in Great Brit ain it requires the aid of artificial heat. In the northern United States capers are propagated by cuttings in greenhouses, but they are grown from seed in the South. It is a trailing, ram bling shrub, loving dry places and often growing on rocks or walls. It begins to flower early in summer, and continues flowering till winter. The buds are gathered every morning, and are immediately put into vinegar and salt. At the end of the season they are sorted according to their size and color, the greenest and least ex panded being the best, and are again put into vinegar, the finest being sent to the market in bottles, the coarser in small barrels. The fruit,
which is a small berry, is also pickled in the south of Italy. The flower-buds of the caper of Mount Sinai (Capparis Sinaica) are pickled like those of the common species; the seeds are also pickled and are called by a name signifying mountain pepper. The fruit of Capparis aphylla is made into a pickle in India. The species of Capparis number about 150, and are found in most tropical and subtropical regions except North America. Various substitutes for caper are sometimes used, as the flower-buds of the marsh-marigold (Caltha palustris), tbose of the Indian cress, or so-called nasturtium (Tropro lum majus), and those of the bean-caper (Zygophyllum fabago) and of the bladdernut (Staphylea trifolia). The caper-tree (Capparis Jaw:lee:Isis), which grows throughout the West Indies, in South America, and in Florida, is a small tree with a very hard wood. The caper of England is a spurge, belonging to the genus Eupborbia. It has no relationship with the fore going. For illustration, see Plate of CAMELLIAS.