THE AMERICAN WHALEMAN. 129 



After partaking freely of the Guayaquil orange and the 

 delicious fig - bananas, we found the cherimoya the most 

 delicate, luscious, and ambrosial of all fruits. Under the 

 temptations of the black-eyed, smiling Eves, we nibbled, and 

 tasted, and ate, in utter forgetfulness of our captain's well- 

 meant warning. But after eating a hatful of cherimoyas, 

 we had to yield to even that most exquisite fruit. Satiated 

 and used up, we then recalled the wise counsel of the cap- 

 tain, and determined to be prudent, abstinence being so easy 

 a virtue when we had all we desired. To settle the good 

 things eaten, however, and recover room for yet untasted 

 sillwaula plums, papie, melons, etc., we walked a short dis- 

 tance into the woods to see the banana- orchards. I was 

 surprised at the limited area in cultivation, which not only 

 furnished twenty families with the staple of life, but left an 

 abundance for ships visiting the bay. 



Humboldt has told us that this plant surpasses all others 

 in the production of fopd for man. It seemed credible to 

 us as we stood beneath the broad foliage, and saw suspended 

 from the twenty or thirty stems the great bunches in every 

 stage of development short of ripeness. The orchards were 

 fenced by bamboo rails lashed to posts or living trees, and 

 were bordered with orange, and the cassava, or tapioca 

 plant. The orange, guava, limes, pepper, and calabash trees 

 were growing wild. 



I believe it is an axiom in natural history that there are 

 three misstatements in the vulgar description of the crab : 

 "A fish, of a red color, that runs backward." When the 

 naturalist visits Selango, he will nevertheless see the beach 

 covered with^crabs which are red, and which do run back- 

 ward of necessity, as they would expose their defenseless 

 tails if they retreated otherwise ; whether fish or not, is a 

 question. The Indians showed us numbers of pearls, some 

 of goodly size, and, to our inexperienced eyes, of great purity 



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