Ethnography of Micronesia. 125 



or six inches in calibre is employed, not only as a pail for carry- 

 ing water from a spring, but sometimes for storing water.^ 



1. Cooking and Culinary Utensils. — In regard to the preparation 

 of food and soine of the cooking utensils employed among the 

 natives of Yap and Palau, a brief description will be given below. 



A. Cooking. — As described elsewhere, the inhabitants of the 

 West Carolines make earthen pots for their own use. In the 

 preparation of food, therefore, they can not only roast or bake, but 

 also boil their food. For example, the taro is either roasted, baked 

 or boiled. The natives eat them after peeling them, or mashing 

 them with a pestle, as they do with the bread-fruit in the East 

 Caroline Islands. 



The boiled vol fruit is eaten as it is or after being grated 

 into small particles. In preparing the fruit, it is also baked. 

 Before baking it is usuaUy ^\Tapped in a piece of the bark of the 

 betel-nut tree and coconut juice poured on it. The voi fruit 

 cooked in this way becomes a sort of cake. In this connection, 

 Christian says " a sucking-pig or fowl stuffed with this fruit and 

 baked in the earth-oven is a dish not to be despised." ^ 



The natives eat fish and shell-fisli raw or after boiling them 

 in salt water. But since in tropical regions these begin to decay 

 in a few hours, they must have methods of preserving tliem. 

 According to Captain Wilson, " the fish being well cleaned, washed, 

 and scaled, two flat sticks are placed lengthways of the fish, to 

 support and keep it straight, much in the same manner as meat 

 is laid in a cradle spit ; around it are bound some broad leaves. 

 They then make a kind of stage or trivet, placed about two feet 

 from the ground, upon which the fish is laid, and a slow fire 



1 G. Keate, " The Pelew Islands," p. 312. 



2 F. W. Chiistian, "The Caroline Islands," p. 33 H. 



