I shall run a Description of the Vegetables, with their Properties, not only because they are the Produce of this Island, but most of them of _Africa_ in general. The Palm-Trees are numerous on the Shores of _Africa_, and may be reckoned the first of their natural Curiosities, in that they afford them Meat, Drink and Cloathing; they grow very straight to 40 and 50 Foot high, and at the top (only) have 3 or 4 Circles of Branches, that spread and make a capacious Umbrella. The Trunk is very rough with Knobs, either Excrescencies, or the Healings of those Branches that were lopped off to forward the Growth of the Tree, and make it answer better in its Fruit. The Branches are strongly tied together with a _Cortex_, which may be unravelled to a considerable Length and Breadth; the inward _Lamella_ of this _Cortex_, I know are wove like a Cloath at _Benin_, and afterwards died and worn: Under the Branches, and close to the Body of the Tree, hang the Nuts, thirty Bunches perhaps on a Tree, and each of thirty Pound Weight, with prickly Films from between them, not unresembling Hedge-Hogs; of these Nuts comes a liquid and pleasant scented Oyl, used as Food and Sauce all over the Coast, but chiefly in the Windward Parts of _Africa_, where they stamp, boil and skim it off in great Quantities; underneath, where the Branches fasten, they tap for Wine, called _Cockra_, in this Manner; the Negroes who are mostly limber active Fellows, encompass themselves and the Trees with a Hoop of strong With, and run up with a great deal of Agility; at the Bottom of a Branch of Nuts, he makes an Excavation of an Inch and a half over, and tying fast his Calabash, leaves it to destil, which it does to two or three Quarts in a Night's Time, when done he plugs it up, and chooses another; for if suffered to run too much, or in the Day Time, the Sap is unwarily exhausted, and the Tree spoiled: The Liquor thus drawn, is of a wheyish Colour, intoxicating and sours in 24 Hours, but when new drawn, is _pleasantest to thirst and hunger both_: It is from these Wines they draw their Arack in _India_. On the very Top of the Palm, grows a Cabbage, called so, I believe, from some resemblance its Tast is thought to have with ours, and is used like it; the Covering has a Down that makes the best of Tinder, and the Weavings of other Parts are drawn out into strong Threads. _Coco-Nut-Trees_ are branch'd like, but not so tall as, _Palm_ Trees, the Nut like them, growing under the Branches, and close to the Trunk; the milky Liquor they contain, (to half a Pint or more,) is often drank to quench Thirst, but surfeiting, and this may be observed in their Way of Nourishment, that when the Quantity of Milk is large, the Shell and Meat are very thin, and harden and thicken in Proportion, as that loses.