40 
TRAVELS IN AFRICA 
from attending to his devotions at the stated 
periods, he must compensate for it by repeating 
the whole ceremony the exact number of times 
he omitted it. 
Their manufactures are the same as those of 
Bondoo, as will be described hereafter. The ve- 
getable productions are indigo, cotton, rice, 
maize, yams, cassada, shalots, andpompions; and 
their fruits are oranges, lemons, plantains, ba- 
nanas, tamarinds, and nittas, or the locust fruit ; ^ 
the latter is a kind of mimosa, very much resem- 
bling the tamarind tree. The flowers or blossoms 
are produced at the extremities of the branches, 
and are succeeded by pods similar to those of a 
garden bean, with the exception of their being 
from nine to twelve inches long, and one broad 5 
each pod contains from nine to twelve black 
stones, resembling those of the tamarind in size 
and shape, but are enveloped in a fine farina- 
ceous powder of the appearance of sublimed sul- 
phur. Its taste is not unlike liquorice-root pow- 
der, and, when mixed with milk, affords a very 
palatable and nutritious diet ; and although some 
of the men, who swallowed the stones of this 
fruit, were affected with sickness at stomach, 
bad as our situation was from the scarcity of 
provisions, it would have been exceedingly ag- 
gravated, had the nittas not been ripe before we 
left the Panjetta. 
