183 MANUFACTURED PRODUCTS. [1839. 



zontally over the shoulder, and a portion of the burden at- 

 tached to either end. 



Sugar, cocoa-nut oil and arrow-root, are the chief articles 

 of commerce, which require to be manufactured before being 

 fit for market. Much larger quantities of these might be 

 produced, were the natives more industrious. The annual 

 product of sugar, probably the most important of all, is 

 steadily increasing. Nearly two hundred tons are raised on 

 the plantations of Tahiti, and half that quantity on those of 

 Eimeo, in the space of a year. One hundred tons of cocoa- 

 nut oil were once annually exported, but, in consequence of 

 some unwise restrictive measures of the government, there is 

 much less obtained. The oil is extracted in a very simple 

 manner : — the kernel is chopped up in fine pieces, and placed 

 in a trough, so inclined, that when the oil is expelled by the 

 heat of the sun it will trickle down into a reservoir placed 

 beneath ; it is preserved in pieces of bamboo cut off at the 

 joints, and is used for lubricating machinery and making 

 soap, and, when perfumed, is burnt in lamps. The value of 

 the arrow-root annually prepared, is about five thousand 

 dollars. As in other countries, the root is washed and beaten 

 into a pulp, and the fecula separated from the fibrous matter 

 by elutriation through sieves. 



Attempts have been made by the missionaries to introduce 

 cotton spinning and weaving, at Tahiti, but with little or no 

 success ; and a carpet factory established at Eimeo, has 

 failed. Yet the natives are not deficient in mechanical in- 

 genuity. In former times, skill in the manufacture of tapa 

 was esteemed an important female accomplishment, and, as 

 such, highly prized. All the labor in preparing this native 

 cloth is performed by women, and those who continue to 

 make it are as proud of their stores, as were our Dutch 

 grandmothers of their rolls of kersey and heaps of linen. 

 The tapa is made of the inner fibres of the bark from the 

 branches of the bread-fruit tree. These fibres are macerated, 

 and then beaten on a long spring-board, slightly convex, with 

 a small grooved mallet, under which proeess, while in a moist 



