32 . MEMOIR OF 



Ray replies, " If you go to Jamaica, I pray you 

 a safe and prosperous voyage. We expect great 

 things from you, no less than the resolving all our 

 doubts about the names we meet with of plants 

 in that part of America, as the Dildoe, Mammee, 

 Mangrove, Manchinello, Avellanae purgatrices, 

 the Sower-sop and Custard apple.* Of most of 

 which, though I am pretty well informed and 

 satisfied by Dr Robinson, yet I shall be glad to 

 be either confirmed, or better informed by so 

 knowing and curious an observer as yourself. I 

 should be glad to know what manner of fruit 

 the Mandioca bears ; for, whatever some have 

 written, that it is not without, I am confident. You 

 may also please to observe, whether there be any 

 species of plants common to America and Europe, 

 and whether Ambergrise be the juice of any sort 



* A contemporary of Sloane's, gives this account of the 

 custard apple : " When it is ripe we gather it, and keep 

 it one day, and then it is fit to be eaten. We cut a hole 

 at the lesser end (that it may stand the firmer in the dish) 

 so big, as that a spoon may go in with ease, and with the 

 spoon eat it. Never was excellent custard more like 

 itself, than this to it ; only this addition, which makes it 

 transcend all custards that art can make, though of natural 

 ingredients, and that is a fruity taste, which makes it 

 strange and admirable. Many seeds there are in it, but so 

 smooth, as you may put them out of your mouth with some 

 pleasure." Ligon's " True and Exact History of the 

 Island ol Barbadoes, 1673." 



