[Fishing.]
They use upon this coast to fish with harping irons, and wait upon a great fish that cometh once a day to fish along the shore, which is like a grampus. He runneth very near the shore and driveth great shoals of fish before him; and the negroes run along the shore as fast as they are able to follow him, and strike their harping irons round about him, and kill great store of fish, and leave them upon the sand till, the fish hath done feeding; and then they come and gather their fish up.
This fish will many times run himself on ground, but they will presently shove him off again, which is as much as four or five men can do. They call him Emboa, which is in their speech a dog, and will by no means hurt or kill any of them.[195]
Also, they use in the bays and rivers, where shoal water is, to fish with mats, which are made of long rushes, and they make them of an hundred fathoms long. The mats swim upon the water, and have long rushes hanged upon one edge of the mat, and so they draw the mat in compass, as we do our nets. The fishes, fearing the rushes that hang down, spring out of the water and fall upon the mat, that lyeth flat on the water, and so are taken.
[“Corn.”]
They have four sorts of corn in Longo. The first is called Masanga,[196] and it groweth upon a straw as big as a reed, and hath an ear a foot long, and is like hempseed. The second is called Masembala.[197] This is of great increase, for of one kernel there springs four or five canes, which are ten foot high, and they bear half a pint of corn apiece. This grain is as big as tares, and very good. Thirdly, they have another that groweth low like grass, and is very like mustard-seed: and this is the best.[198] They have also the great Guinea wheat, which they call Mas-impoto.[199] This is the least esteemed.
[Ground-nuts.]
They have very good Peason [peas], somewhat bigger than ours, but they grow not as ours do; for the pods grow on the roots, underneath the ground, and by their leaves they know when they be ripe.[200] They have another kind of Peason, which they call Wando.[201] This is a little tree, and the first year that it is planted it beareth no fruit; but after, it beareth fruit three years, and then it is cut down.[202]