.^ 



404 . FOOD PLANTS. [chap. 



so that no smoke or steam could escape. In about" 

 quarter of an liour, the whole was most deliciously cooked. 

 The choice green parcels were now laid on a cloth of 

 banana leaves, and with a cocoa-nut shell we drank the 

 cool water of the running" stream ; and thus we enjoyed 

 our rustic meal. 



I could not look on the surrounding plants without 

 admiration. On every side were forests of banana ; the 

 fruit of which, tiiough serving for food in various ways, 

 lay in heaps decaying on the ground. In front of us there 

 was an extensive brake of wild sugar-cane ; and the stream 

 was shaded by the dark green knotted stem of the Ava — • 

 so famous in former days for its powerful intoxicating 

 effects. I chewed a piece, and found that it had an acrid 

 and unpleasant taste, which would have induced any one 

 at once to have pronounced it poisonous. Thanks to the 

 missionaries, this plant now thrives only in these deep 

 ravines, innocuous to ev^ry one. Close by I saw the wild 

 arum, the roots of which, when well baked, are good to 

 eat, and the young leaves better than spinach. There was 

 the wild yam, and a liliaceous plant called Ti, which grows 

 in abundance, and has a soft brown root, in shape and 

 size like a huge log of wood : this served us for dessert, for 

 it is as sweet as treacle, and with a pleasant taste. There 

 were, moreover, several other wild fruits, and useful vege- 

 tables. The little stream, besides its cool water, produced 

 eels and cray-fish. I did indeed admire this scene, when I 

 compared it with an uncultivated one in the temperate 

 zones. I felt the force of the remark, that man, at least 

 savage man, with his reasoning powers only partly 

 developed, is the child of the tropics. 



As the evening drew to a close, I strolled beneath the 

 gloomy shade of the bananas up the course of the stream. 

 My walk was soon brought to a close, by coming to a 

 waterfall between two and three hundred feet high ; and 

 again above this there was another. I mention all these 

 waterfalls in this one brook, to give a general idea of the 

 inclination of the land. In the little recess where the water 

 fell, it did not appear that a breath of wind had ever blown. 

 The thin edges of the great leaves of the banana, damp 

 with spray, were unbroken, instead of being, as is so 

 gt n-rally the case, split into a thousand shreds. From 

 our position, almost suspended on the mountain-side, there 

 were glimpses into the depths of the neighbouring valleys ; 



