Word: fern
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...young man who felt the lure was Fernão Mendes Pinto, son of a down-at-heel nobleman. He resolved to join the army and, once in the East, switch to trading. In 1537, at the age of 28, he sailed for Goa, Portugal's main outpost in India. Before he saw Portugal again, he was to visit all the lands of Asia, to be a merchant, a pirate, a slave, an ambassador and a Jesuit novice...
...manuscript of his adventures. It was never published in his lifetime, but he had official recognition of a sort anyway. In 1583, in his 74th year, the Portuguese government awarded him a pension of two hogsheads of corn annually "for his services in India." Four months later, Fernão Mendes Pinto was dead...
...cheeses sent to him by friendly farmers. His idea of relaxation is reading law books. A Mormon,* he never smokes, sips a Scotch highball only when it seems to be the necessary social gesture. Yet, while maintaining the appearance of the man who gets lost behind a potted fern at cocktail parties, the Secretary of Agriculture has become one of the most controversial figures in U.S. public life...
...that moment, Charles Franklin Brannan stepped from behind his potted fern. Those who know Brannan as a sincere and honest man, comparatively unsullied by the politician's instinct, swear that it was coincidence; those who know politics call it fine timing. Anyway, in Charlie's hand was the Brannan Plan. It was rigged with something for the consumer as well as the farmer. The plan would guarantee farmers a tremendous, slightly varying total income each year (about $26 billion-or its equivalent in purchasing power). Brannan's Plan had a lot of hooks...
Like New Yorkers, habaneros worry about their water supply. Long a perplexing problem because of Havana's never-ceasing growth and the difficulties of piping it into town, the shortage of water led Mayor Fernández Supervielle to suicide three years ago. His successor Nicolás Castellanos, former president of the city council, refused to despair. Energetically he built up the city's reservoirs. Last week a grateful citizenry elected Castellanos mayor in his own right...