The Mbono or Palma Christi springs up spontaneously, as in most tropical regions, throughout Zanzibar Island and on the coast. The Hindus say of a man with more vanity than merit, ‘The castor shrub grows where other plants can’t.’ The seed is toasted in iron pots, pounded, and boiled to float the oil. After aloes it is the popular cathartic, and it is rubbed upon the skin to soften the muscles, with an effect which I leave to the nasal imagination.
Cinnamon and nutmeg trees were planted by the late Sayyid, and flourished well on some soils. The latter takes nine years, it is said, before bearing fruit, and gives trouble—two fatal objections in Arabs’ eyes. The spice is now imported from India. When at Kazah of Unyamwezi I saw specimens brought, it is said, from the Highlands of Karagwah, but the plentiful supply from the farther East would prevent this trade being here developed. The cacao shrub (chocolate), which thrives so well at Prince’s Island and Fernando Po in the Biafran Bight, has never, I believe, been tried in Zanzibar.
The Mpira, or caoutchouc tree, flourishes in the Island, and on the adjacent Continent. The people of Eastern Madagascar tap it in the cold season, and have sent large cargoes to America. Mr Macmillan, U. S. Consul, Zanzibar, offered $1000 for good specimens, but the Wasawahili would not take the trouble to make a few incisions. I heard of two varieties, a ficus and a lliana; there are probably many more: about the Gaboon river the valuable gum is the produce of a vine or climber, with an edible fruit, and the people have learned to extract a coarse article, and to adulterate it till it is hardly tradeable. Here they use the thinner branches, well oiled for suppleness, as ‘bakurs’—the policeman’s truncheon, the cat-o’-nine-tails, the ‘Chob,’ and the ‘Palmatorio’ of E. Africa. I may here remark that our gourd-shaped articles resist the climate of Zanzibar, whilst the squares and the vulcanized preparations become sticky and useless. The London-made blankets of smooth and glazed caoutchouc are so valuable that no traveller should be without them: those that are not polished, however, cannot be called waterproof; becoming wet inside, they are unpleasantly cold. For exposure to the sun white impermeables must be preferred to black, and a first-rate article is required; our cheap boots and cloaks soon opened, and when exposed to great heat they were converted into a viscid mass.
The tamarind, as in India, is a splendid tree, but the fruit, though used for acidulated drinks, is not prepared for exportation. A smooth-rooted sarsaparilla, of lighter colour than the growth of the Brazil and Jamaica, is found wild upon the Island and the coast. The orchilla, which gives its name to the Insulæ Purpurariæ, has been tried, and, resembling that of the Somali country, it gives good colour. This lichen chooses the forks of trees in every lagoon. In the Consular report by Lieutenant-Colonel Playfair on the trade of Zanzibar for the year 1863, I find—‘Orchilla is obtained from the more arid parts of the coast to the north: none grows on the Island.’
The people of Zanzibar are fond of fruits, especially the mango, the orange, the banana, and the pine-apple. All of these, however, except the plantain—the bread-fruit of Africa—are seedlings, and engrafting is not practised. Wall-fruit is of course unknown.
The mango, originally imported from India, and as yet unplanted in the central regions, is of many varieties, which lack, however, distinguishing names. Two kinds are common—a large green fruit like the Alphonse (Affonso) of Western India, and a longer pome, with bright red-yellow skin, resembling the Goanese ‘Kola.’ These, with care, might rival the famous produce of Bombay: even in their half-wild state the flavour of turpentine is hardly perceptible. The fruit is said to be heating, and to cause boils. The Arabs spoil its taste by using steel knives: with the unripe fruit they make, however, excellent jams, and pickles[[57]] eaten in broths of fowl or meat. The pounded kernels are administered in dysenteries, but the relish or sauce of which the Gaboon people are so fond is unknown here and even in India. The fruit is most plentiful during the N. East monsoon.
There are many varieties of the orange, all, however, inferior to the produce of the Azores and the Brazil, of Malta and the Mozambique. The ‘native’ fruit, supposed to be indigenous, is green, not so sweet as the kinds grown by the Portuguese, and the coat must be loosened by two days’ exposure to the sun or it can hardly be removed. It seldom ripens before the beginning of July, and it is best in August. The Persian variety, from about Bandar Abbas, comes to market in early May; it has grown common since 1842, and it has excelled its original stock. The peel is loose and green, and the meat, when cleared of pips, tastes somewhat like currants. The small brick-red Mandarin is good, and resembles the African and Brazilian Tangerine. The trees want care, they run to wood, the fruit is often covered with a hard, rough, thick, and almost inseparable rind, and the inside is full of bitter seeds, pithy placenta, and fluffy skins. The wild oranges upon the Island and the Continent resemble those which we call Seville. As a rule the ‘golden apple’ abounds from May to October. It is considered cooling, antibilious, and antiseptic, especially when eaten before other food in the early morning. Thus it was a saying in the Brazil that the physician does not enter that house where orange-peel is strewed about. In West Africa the Rev. Mr Brown[[58]] of Texas judged the fruit harshly, and predicted the death of a brother missionary who was too fond of it. Many boxes and bags of oranges are carried as presents from Zanzibar to the northern ports (Banadir), Aden, and even Bombay; ‘Gulf-Arabs,’ who have not such luxuries at home, will here devour a basket-full at a sitting. The sweet limes of Zanzibar are considered inferior to none by those who enjoy the sickly ‘mawkish’ flavour: the acid limes are cheap, plentiful, and aromatic; they are second only to those grown about Maskat, the ne plus ultra of perfume and flavour. The Pamplemouse or Shaddock, the Pummalo of Bombay (Citrus Decumana), has been planted upon the Island, but the people declare that it will not ripen: the same is said of the citron, and the Zanzibarians ignore the Persian art of preserving it.
Bananas at Zanzibar are of two varieties, red and yellow: they are not remarkable for delicacy of taste. In the highlands of the interior, as Usumbara and Karagwah, the ‘musa’ may be called the staff of life. The plantain, in India termed ‘horse-plantain,’ is a coarse kind, sometimes a foot long, and full of hard black seeds: Europeans fry it in butter, and the people hold it to be a fine ‘strong’ fruit. The musa bears during all the year in Zanzibar, but it is not common in May and June.
The pine-apple of the New World grows almost wild in every hedgerow and bush: cultivation and planting near running water would greatly improve it. At present the crown is stuck in the earth, and is left to its fate wherever the place may be. Strangers are advised to remove the thick outer rind, including all the ‘eyes,’ which, adhering to the coats of the stomach, have caused inflammation, dysentery, and death. The ananas ripens in the cold season: when it is found throughout the twelve months the people predict that next year it will fail. It is, in fact, a biennial, like the olive in Palestine.
The especial fruits of the poor are the Fanas or ‘Jack’ of India, and an even more fetid variety, the ‘Doriyan,’ which certain writers call the ‘Aphrodisiac dorion.’ Some Europeans have learned to relish the evil savour, and all declare the Jack to be very wholesome. Hindus refuse to touch it, because it is ‘heating food:’ they say the same, however, of all fruits with saccharine juices. The nuts are roasted, and eaten with salt, as in India, and the villagers fatten their poultry with ‘the rind and the rotten.’