The
land joining Mt. d'Ely to the main is mere alluvium.
NOTE 3. - Barbosa says that throughout the kingdom of Cananor the pepper
was of excellent quality, though not in great quantity. There was much
ginger, not first-rate, which was called Hely from its growing about
Mount d'Ely, with cardamoms (names of which, Ela in Sanskrit, Hel
Persian, I have thought might be connected with that of the hill),
mirobolans, cassia fistula, zerumbet, and zedoary. The two last items are
two species of curcuma, formerly in much demand as aromatics; the last
is, I believe, the setewale of Chaucer: -
"There was eke wexing many a spice,
As clowe gilofre and Licorice,
Ginger and grein de Paradis,
Canell and setewale of pris,
And many a spice delitable
To eaten when men rise from table." - R. of the Rose.
The Hely ginger is also mentioned by Conti.
NOTE 4. - This piratical practice is noted by Abdurrazzak also: "In other
parts (than Calicut) a strange practice is adopted. When a vessel sets
sail for a certain point, and suddenly is driven by a decree of Divine
Providence into another roadstead, the inhabitants, under the pretext that
the wind has driven it thither, plunder the ship. But at Calicut every
ship, whatever place it comes from, or wherever it may be bound, when it
puts into this port, is treated like other vessels, and has no trouble of
any kind to put up with" (p. 14). In 1673 Sivaji replied to the pleadings
of an English embassy, that it was "against the Laws of Conchon"
(Ptolemy's Pirate Coast!) "to restore any ships or goods that were
driven ashore." (Fryer, p. 261.)
NOTE 5.
