Sir Hans Sloane to Mr. Ray. 207 



Mountains of Auvergne^ where are many Curiofities. 

 We are now mighty felicitous about the Jefuits-Bark^ 

 or Cortex Peruvianus^ it being fo good a Drug, that 

 they begin to adulterate it with Black-Cherry, and 

 other Barks dipt in a TinBure of Aloes , to make it 

 bitter j but the Bitternefs of the adulterated Bark ap«* 

 pears upon its firft Touch with the Tongue ; where- 

 as the other is a pretty while in the Mouth before it 

 be tafted. I am, &c. « 



Dr. Robinfon to Mr. Ray. 



SIR, London^ May zt. — 87. 



MOrifieur Bernier, who pafled the Red Sea into 

 Arabia, doth affirm in a private Letter, that 

 the Arabs allured him that the Coffee Fruit was {own 

 every Year under Trees, up which it did climb and 

 tun j from which he concludes it to be a Species of 

 Convolvulus. I think he might as well have conclu- 

 ded it to be a Phafeolus, or fome other Scandent Le- 

 gume. If M. Bemierw&s truly informed of its annu- 

 al Sowing and Climbing, then Alpinus never faw the 

 true Coffee Plant. The Arabians are as careful in de* 

 ilroying the germinating Faculty of the Coffee Fruity 

 or Seed, by boiling or burning, as the Dutch of the 

 Molucco's are in their Nutmegs. I have fpoke with 

 feveral curious Perfons that have been feveral times 

 in ALgypt, and they all faid that they never law the 

 Coffee Plant 5 neither (as I remember) did Beilonim 

 ever meet with it in that Country, or Arabia $ fcs 

 the Coffee is faid only to grow in that Part of Ara* 

 bia that lies within the Tropick. 



I have examined many Coffee Berries (as they call 

 them) here at London, and am aim oil perfuaded by 

 my own Obfervation^ that they are neither Berries^ 



nor 



