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peach

(Science: botany) A well-known high-flavored juicy fruit, containing one or two seeds in a hard almond-like endocarp or stone; also, the tree which bears it (prunus, or Amygdalus Persica). In the wild stock the fruit is hard and inedible. Guinea, or sierra Leone, peach, the large edible berry of the Sarcocephalus esculentus, a rubiaceous climbing shrub of west tropical Africa. Palm peach, the fruit of a Venezuelan palm tree (Bactris speciosa). Peach colour, the pale red colour of the peach blossom.

(Science: zoology) Peach-tree borer, the larva of a clearwing moth (aegeria, or Sannina, exitiosa) of the family aegeriidae, which is very destructive to peach trees by boring in the wood, usually near the ground; also, the moth itself.

Origin: OE. Peche, peshe, OF. Pesche, F. Peche, fr. LL. Persia, L. Persicum (sc. Malum) a Persian apple, a peach. Cf. Persian, and Parsee.