Page:Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks.djvu/402

344 that not one would believe them to be sheep till they heard their voices, which are precisely the same as those of European ones. Their flesh was like that of the buffaloes, lean and void of flavour, to me the worst mutton I have ever eaten.

Their fowls are chiefly of the game breed and large; but the eggs are the smallest I have ever seen.

Besides these animals there are great plenty of dogs, some cats and rats, and a few pigeons, of which I saw three or four pair. Nor are any of these animals exempted from furnishing their part towards the support of polyphagous man, except the rats, which alone they do not eat.

Fish appeared to us to be scarce, indeed it was but little valued by these islanders, none but the very inferior people ever eating it, and these only at the time when their duties or business required them to be down upon the sea beach. In this case every man was provided with a light casting-net, which was girt round him and served as part of his dress; with this he took any small fish which might happen to come in his way. Turtles are scarce; they are esteemed a good food, but are very seldom taken.

Of the vegetables most are well known. The sweet sop is a pleasant fruit well known to the West Indians. Blimbi alone is not mentioned by any voyage-writer I have met with: it is a small oval fruit, thickest in the middle and tapering a little to each end, three or four inches in length, and scarcely as large as a man's finger; the outside is covered with very thin skin of a light green colour, and in the inside are a few seeds disposed in the form of a star; its flavour is a light, but very clean and pleasant acid. It cannot be eaten raw, but is said to be excellent in pickles; we stewed it and made sour sauce to our stews and bouilli, which was very grateful to the taste, and doubtless possessed no small share of antiscorbutic virtues. But what seems to be the genuine natural production of the island, and which they have in the greatest abundance and take the most care of, is the fan-palm or toddy-tree (Borassus flabellifer). Large groves of these trees are to be seen in all parts of the island, under which other crops, as maize, indigo, etc., are planted, so that in reality they take