Page:Uganda By Pen and Camera.djvu/43

they are the same. Indeed, it is almost impossible to tell the difference when seeing a plantain and banana growing side by side. An idea of the taste of plantains may be gathered by mixing together a potato, a turnip, and an artichoke. They are usually steamed in their own leaves, and the natives who can get two meals a day, at noon and at evening, are perfectly happy. Some varieties are sweet, but the natives do not care much for these. There are also sweet bananas, of which the country produces many excellent varieties, but they are chiefly used for making beer, by squeezing out the juice and fermenting it with millet seeds, which the natives call ‘mwembe,’ the beer thus made being called ‘mwenge,’ An unfermented kind is much drunk, and is called ‘mubisi,’ but this turns sour in the stomach if a quantity is drunk. They grow a great quantity of sweet potatoes, which they use chiefly in time of drought,