CHAPTER X

FRUITS

THE  BANANA

The Sherbro is a land of fruits, the principal, of course,
being the banana. The banana is not, strictly speaking,
indigenous, as it requires to be planted.

Bananas seem to thrive anywhere and everywhere. I
am even growing them luxuriantly in my compound, which
is a sandy soil and not fifty feet from the river side, where
the water is salt. Figure 24 is from a photograph of a
banana plant within this ground, and it gives a very good
idea of the way the banana grows. The bunch of fruit
hanging down had certainly not less than 180 bananas on
It; and so great was the weight that three days after it was
photographed the tree broke down under it. This particular
tree was planted about a year before from a small sucker.
The banana produces only one bunch of fruit, but it is
most prolific, as young plants shoot up from the bottom, in
their turn producing fruit and suckers, as shown in the
picture, so that very soon a great cluster of plants is seen.

The growing of bananas for the export market appears
to me to be worth serious consideration.

It is only within the last few years that the,banana has