[30]Gourds are continually mentioned in books of travel, and as the word remained mysterious to me from my eighth to my twentieth year I explain in detail. Certain species of melon-like plants produce a hard-skinned fruit, the bitter pulp of which dries up to a powder, leaving the skins hollow. Cut a hole in this, clear out the seeds and fibre, and you have a basin or a bottle according to the shape of the fruit. Only the former shape is seen on the Red Sea coast.
[31]Is “coffee bean” a corruption of the Arabic bûn?
[32]This is of course the regular way of making Turkish coffee and can be imitated at home by anyone. The coffee should be finely ground or crushed like cocoa.
[33]The sheet is passed round a smooth thick thwart and one or two of the crew take up the slack as the rest haul in. This to some extent takes the place of tackle.
[34]They do not bale water out of a canoe, but throw it with a paddle, shell or broken wooden bowl! The method is very effective.
[35]Merely to see the bottom, without distinguishing small objects, is often possible at greater depths still.
[36]The flesh of the pearl oysters and clams are only eaten when all else fails and as fish is obtainable in times of scarcity it is not much appreciated when anything else is to be had.
[37]Unlike the Ballistes, some species at least are able to swallow the flesh of shellfish without the shells, so that the only indications of the origin of their diet is by finding opercula and radulae among the half-digested mass. They also break up pearl oysters, leaving the ground strewn with the broken shells.
[38]The rather majestic term “Shêkh” often means nothing more than this, though it also includes persons of real importance and power in the country, and saints devoutly venerated.
[39]Donkeys’ dung provides a cheap substitute for soap. The clothes are buried in the sand of the sea-shore with dung, left overnight and washed out in the sea next day.