57 



instead of a bag-pudding, which they call a buff-jacket ; and this is 

 a very good way for a change. This fruit makes also very good 

 tarts ; and the green plantains sliced thin, and dried in the sun and 

 grated, will make a sort of flour which is very good to make puddings. 

 A ripe plantain, sliced and dried in the sun, may be preserved a great 

 while, and then eats like figs, very sweet and pleasant. The Darien 

 Indians preserve them a long time, by drying them gently over the 

 fire, mashing them first, and moulding them into lumps. The Moskito 

 Indians will take a ripe plantain and roast it ; then take a pint and 

 half of water in a calabash, and squeeze the plantain in pieces 

 with their hand, mixing it with the water ; then they drink it 

 all off together ; this they call mishlaw, and it is pleasant and 

 sweet and nourishing, somewhat like lambs- wool (as it is called) 

 made with apples and ale ; and of this fruit alone many thousands of 

 Indian families in the West Indies have their whole subsistence." 



Coming to later times Lunan in Hortus Jamaicensis, p. 74, quoting 

 Labat, says : " When the natives of the West Indies undertake a voyage 

 they make provision of a paste of banana, which, in case of need, 

 serves them for nourishment and drink ; for this purpose they take 

 ripe bananas, and, having squeezed them through a fine sieve, form 

 the solid fruit into small loaves, which are dried in the sun or in hot 

 ashes, after being previously wrapped up in the leaves of Indian 

 flowering reed. When they would make use of this paste they 

 dissolve it in water, which is very easily done, and the liquor, thereby 

 rendered thick, has an agreeable acid taste imparted to it, which makes 

 it both refreshing and nourishing." 



In the green state and cooked in various ways plantains supply the 

 staple food of millions of people in tropical America. In fact M they are 

 so extensively consumed as to almost take the place of cereal grains as a 

 common article of diet. About 6^ pounds of the fruit or 2 pounds 

 of the dry meal with a quarter of a pound of salt meat or fish form in 

 the West Indies the daily allowance for a labourer." In Jamaica the 

 working negroes prefer plantains to bread ; the former they boil or roast 

 in ashes and eat when quite warm. The ripe fruit when it is yellow and 

 has acquired a sweetish flavour is sliced and fried or baked. It has 

 then a pleasant sweet flavour, slightly acid, and very much resembling 

 baked apples. 



In Central America, according to Seemann, the plantain furnishes the 

 inhabitants with the chief portion of their food. Similarly we have the 

 testimony of Belt that " Next to maize, plantains and bananas form the 

 principal sustenance of the natives in Nicaragua. There are a great 

 many varieties of them, and they are cooked in many ways, boiled, 

 baked, made into pastry, or eaten as a fruit. The varieties differ, not 

 only in their fruits, but in the colour of their leaves and stems." 



Usually the bunches of fruit, both in the plantain and the banana, are 

 cut before they are quite ripe, or when the first fruits are beginning to 

 turn yellow. They are then hung up to ripen gradually under cover. 

 There are, however, other methods adopted. The plantains especially, 

 are sometimes taken from the bunch and packed loosely in a hole in 

 the ground and well covered over. In this way they become softer and 

 have a better appearance than if dried in the sun. When a hole is not 

 available they are placed in a barrel in straw and also covered over. 

 Monteiro, who travelled in Angola, refers to the domestic uses of the 

 fruit as under :~ 



