ef produce and staple commodity of the
country, is never mixed by the natives in their food. They esteem it
heating to the blood, and ascribe a contrary effect to the cayenne; which
I can say, my own experience justifies. A great diversity of curries is
usually served up at the same time, in small vessels, each flavoured to a
nice discerning taste in a different manner; and in this consists all the
luxury of their tables. Let their quantity or variety or meat be what it
may, the principle article of their food is rice, which is eaten in a
large proportion with every dish, and very frequently without any other
accompaniment than salt and chili-pepper. It is prepared by boiling in a
manner peculiar to India; its perfection, next to cleanness and
whiteness, consisting in its being, when thoroughly dressed and soft to
the heart, at the same time whole and separate, so that no two grains
shall adhere together. The manner of effecting this is by putting into
the earthen or other vessel in which it is boiled a quantity of water
sufficient to cover it, letting it simmer over a slow fire, taking off
the water by degrees with a flat ladle or spoon that the grain may dry,
and removing it when just short of burning. At their entertainments the
guests are treated with rice prepared also in a variety of modes, by
frying it in cakes or boiling a particular species of it mixed with the
kernel of the coconut and fresh oil, in small joints of bamboo. This is
called lemmang. Before it is served up they cut off the outer rind of the
bamboo and the soft inner coat is peeled away by the person who eats.

FLESH-MEAT.

They dress their meat immediately after killing it, while it is still
warm, which is conformable with the practice of the ancients as recorded
in Homer and elsewhere, and in this state it is said to eat tenderer than
when kept for a day: longer the climate will not admit of, unless when it
is preserved in that mode called dinding. This is the flesh of the
buffalo cut into small thin steaks and exposed to the heat of the sun in
fair weather, generally on the thatch of their houses, till it is become
so dry and hard as to resist putrefaction without any assistance from
salt. Fish is preserved in the same manner, and cargoes of both are sent
from parts of the coast where they are in plenty to those where
provisions are in more demand. It is seemingly strange that heat, which
in a certain degree promotes putrefaction, should when vi