CHAPTER IX

Summary

The banana is a tree nine to ten feet high, very common in India, and wondrous tender, like a cabbage-stalk, and yet as big as a man's thigh. It is all covered with several sheathings one over the other, like our leeks; when these are removed the heart remains, of the thickness of the arm, which is used for making soup; the leaves are of an ell and a half in length and half an ell in width. The Gentile Indians use these leaves in place of table-cloths and plates in taking their meals, and the same leaves never serve twice. The fruit is very delicate and precious; little children are fed upon it as pap. Each tree produces but once, and is then cut down; but soon it casts forth new shoots, each of which produces the same fruit once a year. The tree exists in great quantity. The fruit grows in a bunch containing as many as 200 or 300; each is as thick as the arm, and a foot long, and very good and well-flavoured to eat; it is to be got at all seasons; at first it is green, afterwards it becomes yellow, and then is ripe. The Maldivians have large orchards full of it.