374 NATURAL HISTORY OF ARABIA. 



mon oranges, cut through the middle while green, dried in 

 the air, and steeped forty days in oil, they prepare an essence 

 famous among old women for restoring a fresh black colour 

 to gray hairs.* Though wine is forbidden, they plant vines, 

 and have a gi-eat variety of grapes, a small kind of which, 

 without stones, called zebib or hschmis, they dry and export 

 in considerable quantities. They also prepare from mint a 

 syrup known by the name of dubs or debs, which they find a 

 lucrative article of commerce. 



The Banians have imported, many fruit-trees from India, 

 which have all become naturalized in their adopted country ; 

 such are the banana {Muf^a, Linn.), the mango {Mangifcra 

 indixa, Linn.), the papaya {Carica papaya, Linn.), a Cissus, 

 an excellent counterpoison, the cocoa, and the Indian fig- 

 tree {Ficus religiosa). The singular property that the latter 

 possesses of propagating itself by means of filaments shoot- 

 ing from its boughs, which take root on reaching the ground 

 and spring up into new trunks, is well known. Forskal saw 

 more than a dozen species of fig-trees, not one of which are 

 mentioned by Limiagus ; but their fruit was far from being 

 agreeable, and seldom eaten as food. The bark of one spe- 

 cies was used in tanning leather ; and the leaves of another 

 were so rough that they served for cleaning and polishing' 

 iron. At Beit el Fakih he found some fine ornamental trees^ 

 which he supposed to be of Indian origin ; but, as their char- 

 acteristics were different from those of an}' other known spe- 

 cies, he classed them in two new genera, under the names 

 of Hyper anther a and Binectaria {Mimusops obtusifolia of 

 botanists). 



By far the most common and important of the palm tribe 

 is the date-tree, the fruit of which constitutes the staple 

 nourishment of the Arabs during the greater part of the 

 year. In Hejaz the places chiefly renowned for this valu- 

 able production are the gardens of Medina, and the valleys 

 at Safra and Jedeida on the route to Mecca. Almost every 

 district, however, has its own variety, wliich grows nowhere 



* From the name Portughan, given to the orange both in Ara- 

 bia and Italy, travellers and naturalists have supposed that it 

 was brought into Europe by the Portuguese. This is a mistake. 

 The orange was cultivated by the Arabs in Sicily and Spain 

 many centuries before the Portuguese vi.sited the East. — See p. 

 102 of this volume. Cod. Diphm. Arab. Sicil., tome i. p. 114. 



