James Forbes letter, Bombay, 1767 December 1, copied between 1794 and 1800

Forbes resumes his narrative two years into his stay at Bombay. He begins with a brief overview of the city’s geography: he notes its island location, the widespread cultivation of rice, and the numerous tropical trees that provide a welcome respite from the unyielding sun. He then begins an extensive review of the natural history of the area. This is, however, a natural history, for the moment, guided by his own concerns as a consumer and observer of Indian life: he focuses on various fruits, vegetables, and edible plants, offers his own comments on certain indigenous practices, and makes occasional comparisons to his own European experiences.

Forbes lists in detail the various fruits one finds in Bombay: he gives brief descriptions of jackfruit, tamarinds, pineapples, custard apples, and melons, while also comparing the oranges and pomegranates of the area to those found elsewhere. He lists the products of the Indian garden, noting the prevalence of chilis, coriander, cucumbers, eggplants, and a wide array of other vegetable and herbs. He describes “oriental dishes” as “highly seasoned, and eaten with a large quantity of rice, which forms the principal food of the natives.”

Several plants receive sustained attention from Forbes. First, he introduces the coconut, the fruit that “most deserves out notice.” He extols its flavor and quality, but also its many uses: he enumerates the variety of products one might get from the tree, especially toddy (palm wine), which “when first drawn is cooling and salutary, but when it is fermented and distilled, it produces a most intoxicating spirit.” The production of various commodities from the coconut tree accounts for, according to Forbes, a not insignificant portion of the government’s revenue. Indeed, the plants and crops Forbes notes throughout his letters would have, over the next few decades, become integral parts of global imperial exchange, in which botanical knowledge—like Forbes’s observations—played a key economic role.

Forbes is equally fascinated with the banyan tree, though for slightly different reasons. While not an economic engine, the banyan tree, for Forbes, offers a window onto indigenous customs. Hindus “think [the tree] an emblem of the Deity, from its long duration, its out-stretching arms, and over-shadowing beneficence: they almost pay it divine honors, and ‘find a Fane in every sacred grove.’” Forbes quotes poet James Thomson’s “The Seasons.” He also discusses “a religious sect of the Hindoos,… the Gymnosophists, or naked philosophers, described by Arian in his valuable remains of ancient history,” before turning to an extensive quotation from Milton’s Paradise Lost.

The mango, compared to its fellow fruits, is the “choicest,” and “when green makes one of the finest pickles in the world.” And the betel-nut is a common pleasure: “Most of the Indians carry it about with them in a small box, like Tobacco; it is presented at visits, and chewed at all hours.” Indian gardens, likewise, are filled with incomparable beauty, though, Forbes suspects, the flowers are “generally too powerful for Europeans.” Elsewhere, the water-lily is the most fascinating blossom: “It is the Nymphoena Lotus of the Ancients, a plant adorned by the Egyptians, and equally venerated by the Hindoos…”

Forbes closes with a brief commentary on the climate: while the rainy season is delightfully verdant, the dry season soon withers much of the foliage. Nonetheless, the temperature is pleasant, though occasionally cold, and “experienced, perhaps more acutely than in Europe, from the natural relaxation of the climate, and the openness of the pores.”

Portions of this text are reproduced in Oriental Memoirs, volume 1, pp. 21-35.

Bibliography:

Brockway, Lucile H. “Science and Colonial Expansion: The Role of the British Royal Botanic Gardens.” American Ethnologist vol. 6 no. 3 (1979): 449-465.