Note 77 — IV. CONCERNING INDIA THE LESS.[71]

Amba (Pers.), the Mango. Ibn Batuta writes it ’anbâ with an ’ain, as appears from Lee’s note (p. 104), and the latter translates it “grape,” which is the meaning of that word I believe in Arabic. Our author’s just description of the flavour of the mango is applicable, however, only to the finer stocks, and seems to show that the “Bombay mango” already existed in the thirteenth century. The mango is commonly believed in Anglo-India to produce boils, which I see was also the belief in Linschoten’s day. But I agree with his commentator, that, at the time when the fruit is ripe, “by reason of the great heate and season of the yeare—many doe fall into the forenamed diseases, although they eate none of this fruite.”