The fruit known to the natives as “mamhangan” is as large as an ostrich’s egg, having a rough, brown skin, and when ripe the yellow flesh which surrounds a mango-like stone is rather agreeable as a juicy sub-acid accompaniment to a dish of plain boiled rice.
The “luing” is another edible fruit, but rarely seen even in its native woods. It is yellow, with brown markings, and rarely exceeds a pigeon’s egg in size. After the thick, leathery husk is removed, one finds a delicate white sub-acid pulp surrounding a small stone. It is rather viscid, with a slight flavour of turpentine. The albumen of the seed is similar to that of a nutmeg.
After the durian, one of the most esteemed of native fruits is, undoubtedly, the “langsat,” which is of a pale yellow or straw-colour, borne in short clusters of four or five together, on a somewhat fastigiate pinnate-leaved tree. The individual fruits are as large as pigeon’s eggs, the part eaten being the four or five segments of white gelatinous pulp within a tough, leathery husk. Of these rarely more than one contains a solitary seed, which, if tasted by accident, is found to be remarkably bitter. The seedless segments are always sweeter and more palatable than the others—indeed, this is the case generally, as exemplified in the mangosteen and rambi. In Singapore this fruit is known under the name of “duku.”
The “rambi,” when plucked from the stalk, is singularly like the langsat in shape, colour, and flavour. The tree, however, is more dwarf, having large entire leaves, and the fruits are borne in ropes of ten or fifteen together, on long drooping stalks. The covering of the fruit is straw-coloured, and tough like that of the langsat, but there are only three segments of pulp in each. The best I ever tasted came from the garden of the British Consulate at Brunei, but I think the “langsat” is preferable in point of flavour. The latter is very commonly seen in groves near the villages of the inland tribes; the “rambi,” on the other hand, is much less abundant, and I never met with it except in European gardens.
The “mangalin” of the Kadyans is a fruit very similar in general structure to the “jintawan,” and consists of ten or twelve pulp-covered seeds enclosed in an orange-like fleshy covering. The flavour is sweet, with a sub-acid after-taste.
The fruits of two kinds of jambosa, or rose-apples, are met with, but like the papaw, cashew-nut, and the apple-fruited guava, they are not esteemed of much account in a country so rich in really delicious kinds.
The sweet melons grown in Borneo are very poor indeed, but good water-melons may now and then be obtained, and are cool and refreshing in such a hot climate. All the members of the orange family do well, especially the delicious little lime, which is perfectly naturalised in many places, being with the dwarf bamboo one of the plants most commonly used for hedges. No cooling drink can possibly surpass that formed by mixing the juice of one of these deliciously perfumed limes in a tumbler of water with a little sugar, and as they keep well they are most valuable to the traveller in hot countries. Common oranges may be procured all the year round from gardens, as also may the small fruited “mandarin” variety, which is a near approach to the tangierine orange, now and then to be had in Covent Garden. It is rather a surprise to find that the oranges cultivated in the tropics have grass-green skins when perfectly ripe, the vivid “orange” fruit so familiar at home being there almost as great a rarity as a grass-green specimen to us in England.
Of all the orange tribe in the East, however, none can compare with the great-fruited pomolo, which under careful cultivation here attains to a state of perfection elsewhere unknown. The pomoloes, or shaddocks, brought to Covent Garden from the West Indian Islands and the Azores, are flavourless as a turnip when compared with the pomoloes of Bangkok or Labuan, or even with those of Northern China or Singapore. There are many varieties, differing much in aroma and flavour, but all are referable to the lemon-fleshed or pink-fleshed types; it is extremely difficult, however, to say which type affords the best variety. A well-grown pomolo is nearly as large as a child’s head, and unless its segments be very carefully divided when serving, the copious grape-like juice which escapes will almost swamp any ordinary dessert-dish, and the best sorts have quite a muscatelle-like flavour; and in addition to its other good qualities it may, like the orange, be kept for a considerable time without injury—so long, indeed, that pomoloes are frequently brought home to England from the Chinese ports in excellent condition. Two sorts of custard apples are commonly met with in Eastern gardens, but neither these nor the apricot-like pulp of the ubiquitous papaw are much esteemed where far better fruits are plentiful. The same remark applies to the “santoel” fruit, which externally resembles a wizened yellow-fleshed American peach, but it contains four stones surrounded by white sub-acid granular pulp, which clings to the stone as in mangosteen or rambutan. The tamarind is naturalised near villages and houses in many of the Eastern islands, its acid pulp being used in cookery, and by pouring boiling water over the pulp, and adding a squeeze of lime juice and a little sugar, a most refreshing fever-drink may be made.
Of palms the cocoanut is most plentiful, and of course the most generally useful. Its top, or heart, may be used as a delicious vegetable equal to asparagus, and the scraped albumen yields the milk so essential to blend or soften a well-made curry. The colourless water in the fresh young nuts is peculiarly valuable and grateful as a beverage, preferable where drinking water is in any way questionable; cocoa-nut oil being, moreover, one of the most valuable of Eastern palm products. The fruit of the “pinang,” or betel-nut palm is as essential to the Malay races as tobacco to our own, and even the fruit of the nipa, or “thatch” palm may be eaten. The astringent pulp which surrounds the seeds of several species of “rattan” palms is occasionally eaten for medicinal purposes. Perhaps one of the most singular of all wild fruits, however, is the “Bawang utan,” or wild onion fruit, which is not unlike a walnut in general appearance, but which is impregnated with such a decided alliaceous principle that a small portion of it grated forms an excellent substitute for the real esculent itself. Scientifically it is known as Scorodoprasum borneense. The foliage and branches of this tree when broken or bruised give off a strong alliaceous odour.
