These shrubs continue to bear for three or four years, when
they have to be rooted out, and new ones substituted.
Of this vegetable
wool, or cotton, they fabricate various kinds of pure white cloth, some
of which I have seen as fine as our best lawns, if not finer. Some of
the coarser sorts they dye in various colours, or stain with a variety
of curious figures.
The ships that go usually from Surat to Mokha, are of exceeding great
burden, some of them, as I believe, exceeding 1400 or 1600 tons; but
they are ill built, and though they have good ordnance, they are unable
for any defence. In these ships there are yearly a vast number of
passengers: As, for instance, in that year in which we left India, there
came 1700 persons, most of whom went not for profit, but out of
devotion, to visit the sepulchre of Mahomet at Medina near Mecca, about
150 leagues from Mokha. Those who have been upon this pilgrimage are
ever after called hoggeis, [hajim] or holy men. This ship, from
Surat for the Red Sea, begins her voyage about the 20th of March and
returns to Surat about the end of September following. The voyage is
short, and might easily be made in two months; but during the long
season of the rains, and a little before and after, the winds are mostly
so violent that there is no putting to sea without extreme hazard.
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