We had still fewer fruits; to the southwards was one somewhat resembling a heart cherry (Eugenia), only the stone was soft: it had nothing but a slight acid to recommend it. To the northward, we had a kind of very indifferent fig (Ficus caudiciflora) growing from the stalk of a tree, a fruit we called plums—like them in colour, but flat like a little cheese—and another much like a damson both in appearance and taste. Both these last, however, were so full of a large stone, that eating them was but an unprofitable business. Wild plantains we had also, but so full of seeds that they had little or no pulp.
For the article of timber there is certainly no want of trees of more than the middling size, and some in the valleys are very large, but all of a very hard nature. Our carpenters, who cut them down for firewood, complained much that their tools were damaged by them. Some trees there are also to the northward, whose soft bark, which easily peels off, is in the East Indies used for caulking ships in lieu of oakum.
Palms here are of three different sorts: the first,[1] which grew plentifully to the southward, has leaves plaited like a fan; the cabbage of these is small, but exquisitely sweet, and the nuts which it bears in great abundance make a very good food for hogs. The second is very like the real cabbage tree of the West Indies, bearing pinnated leaves like those of a cocoanut: this also yields cabbage, which, if not so sweet as the other sort, yet makes ample amends in quantity. The third,[2] which like the second is found only in the northern parts, is low, seldom 10 feet in height, with small pinnated leaves resembling those of some kinds of fern. Cabbage it has none, but generally bears a plentiful crop of nuts, about the size of a large chestnut, and rounder. By the hulls of these, which we found plentifully near the Indian fires, we were assured that these people ate them, and some of our gentlemen tried to do the same, but were deterred from a second experiment by a hearty fit of vomiting. The hogs, however, which were still shorter of
