9. Tamarinds. These are in great plenty, and very cheap: The people, however, do not put them up in the manner practised by the West Indians, but cure them with salt, by which means they become a black mass, so disagreeable to the sight and taste, that few Europeans chuse to meddle with them.
10. Water melons. These are in great plenty, and very good.
11. Pumpkins. These are beyond comparison the most useful fruit that can be carried to sea; for they will keep without any care several months, and with sugar and lemon-juice, make a pye that can scarcely be distinguished from one made of the best of apples; and with pepper and salt, they are a substitute for turnips, not to be despised.
12 Papaws. This fruit when it is ripe is full of seeds, and almost without flavour; but if when it is green it is pared, and the core taken out, it is better than the best turnip.
13. Guava. This fruit is much commended by the inhabitants of our islands in the West Indies, who probably have a better sort than we met with here, where the smell of them was so disagreeably strong that it made some of us sick; those who tasted them said, that the flavour was equally rank.
14. Sweet sop. The Annona Squammosa of Linnæus. This is also a West-Indian fruit: It consists only of a mass of large kernels, from which a small proportion of pulp may be sucked, which is very sweet, but has little flavour.
15. Custard apple. The Annona Reticulata of Linnæus. The quality of this fruit is well expressed by its English name, which it acquired in the West Indies; for it is as like a custard, and a good one too, as can be imagined.
16. The cashew apple. This is seldom eaten on account of its astringency. The nut that grows upon the top of it is well known in Europe.
17. The cocoa-nut. This is also well known in Europe: There are several sorts, but the best of those we found here is called Calappi Edjou, and is easily known by the redness of the flesh between the skin and the shell.
18. Mangostan. The Garcinia Mangostana of Linnæus. This fruit, which is peculiar to the East Indies, is about the size of the crab apple, and of a deep red-wine colour: On the top of it is the figure of five or six small triangles joined in a circle, and at the bottom several hollow green leaves, which are remains of the blossom. When they are to be eaten, the skin, or rather flesh, must be taken off, under which are found six or seven white kernels, placed in a circular order, and the pulp with which these are enveloped, is the fruit, than which nothing can be more delicious: It is a happy mixture of the tart and the sweet, which is no less wholesome than pleasant; and with the sweet orange, this fruit is allowed in any quantity to those who are afflicted with fevers, either of the putrid or inflammatory kind.