VOL. XVIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. ^^ 



dark brown colour, concave on one side, and convex on the other. The seamen 

 shot it sitting on a cliff, by the sea side, and eat it, taking it for a sort of 

 turkey. 



Joseph Acosta, after describing the size of this bird much the same as above, 

 adds, Nature to temper and allay their fierceness has denied them the talons 

 which are given to the eagle, having their feet tipped with claws like a hen ; 

 but their beak is strong enough to tear off the hide, and rip up the bowels of 

 an ox. Two of them will attempt a cow or bull, and destroy him ; and it has 

 often happened that one of them alone has assaulted boys of 1 or 12 years of 

 age and killed them. Their colour is black-and-white like a magpye. They 

 have on the fore-part of their heads a comb, not pointed like that of a cock, 

 but rather even, in the form of a razor. When they alight from the air, they 

 make a stunning and astonishing noise with their wings. 



With respect to the coffee shrub* Mr. Edward Clyve, who was the first who 

 brought a dried branch from Mecca, gives this account of it : The branch 

 was taken off a tree 7 or 8 feet high, is about 5 feet long, and covered with a 

 grey smooth bark ; the wood is white, and the pith not very large ; the twigs are 

 covered with a dark coloured smooth bark, and arise opposite to each other by 

 pairs, coming out of opposite sides of the branch, and cutting each other at 

 right angles. After the same manner the leaves stand on the twigs as the twigs 

 on the branches, at sometimes an inch and sometimes 2 inches distance from 

 each other ; the leaves have -f inch foot-stalks, being about 4 inches long, and 2 

 broad, in the middle, where broadest ; whence they decrease to both extremities 

 ending in a point. They are smooth, whole, and without any incisures on their 

 edges, somewhat like the leaves of a bay. The fruit comes ex alis foliorum, 

 hanging or sticking to the twig by 4. inch-long strings or foot-stalks, and some- 

 times 1 , 2, or more at the same place. These shrubs are planted in Arabia 

 Felix, called Jaman, in a rich mould, and are watered in times of drought by 

 artificial channels cut on purpose from rivers ; and that after 3, 4, or more years 

 bearing, the inhabitants are forced to plant new shrubs, because the old ones 

 are not so fruitful after that time. They dry them in the sun, and afterwards 

 take off the outward husks of the berries by means of hand-mills ; and the 

 Arabians themselves in summer heats use these husks roasted after the manner 

 of coffee-berries, esteeming the drink more cooling, it being sourish to the 

 taste. 



* CofFea arabica. C. floribus quinqueiidis dispermis. Linn. Sp«c, pi. p. 245. 



