ORANGES. 



229 



ever, excellent jams, and pickles 1 eaten in broths 

 of fowl or meat. The pounded kernels are admin- 

 istered in dysenteries, but the relish or sauce of 

 which the Gaboon people are so fond is unknown 

 here and even in India. The fruit is most plen- 

 tiful during the N. East monsoon. 



There are many varieties of the orange, all, 

 however, inferior to the produce of the Azores and 

 the Brazil, of Malta and the Mozambique. The 

 c native ' fruit, supposed to be indigenous, is 

 green, not so sweet as the kinds grown by the 

 Portuguese, and the coat must be loosened by 

 two days' exposure to the sun or it can hardly 

 be removed. It seldom ripens before the begin- 

 ning of July, and it is best in August. The 

 Persian variety, from about Bandar Abbas, 

 comes to market in early May ; it has grown 

 common since 18 42, and it has excelled its 

 original stock. The peel is loose and green, and 

 the meat, when cleared of pips, tastes somewhat 

 like currants. The small brick-red Mandarin is 

 good, and resembles the African and Brazilian 

 Tangerine. The trees want care, they run to 

 wood, the fruit is often covered with a hard, 

 rough, thick, and almost inseparable rind, and 



1 The mango pickles of Makdishu are described by Ibu 

 Batutah in a.d. 1331. 



