34 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol. xxxv. 



the hoops and the sewing is done with fine filaments of rattan. (See 

 Drill.) 



Nibong. — A palm whose leaf sewed with rattan serves for a boat 

 bailer. (Cat. No. 232680, U.S.N.M.) 



Nipa. — A palm Nypa fruticans whose leaves are made by the 

 Malays into coarse, strong " bikars," or sleeping mats. 



Oblique technic. — A process that begins at one corner of a mat or 

 other- structure. In twills, hexagons, octagons, the elements that lean 

 to the right are dextral, or right oblique; to the left, are sinistral, or 

 left oblique. 



Openwork. — Technics in which the parts are not close together. 

 The results are slits, triangles, rectangles, rhombs, pentagons, octa- 

 gons, and irregular open spaces. 



Ornamentation. — Artistic effects in basketwork. It includes the 

 choice and association of a great variety of materials; the adoption 

 of correct shapes and colors in the things made and their parts; in 

 the refinement of technical processes — checker, twine, coil: diamond 

 and scroll patterns in twill and color; in knotwork and braiding; in 

 carving, overlaying, and embroidery. The body is the foundation 

 and background of ornamentation. 



O oerhand. — The knotwork at the tops of uprights on basket borders 

 covering the rim stays are in sailor language called overhand weaving 

 in single strand. The strand may be stem, split, strip, string, or fila- 

 ment. 



Overlaying. — In American basketry the term is applied to the 

 process of laying a pretty straw on a tough fiber; but the Eastern 

 women hide unattractive features with a charming variety in knot- 

 work, braidwork, and sewings. Overlaying in Malaysia occurs rarely 

 in the American sense. 



Packing, or padding. — The insertion of soft material between hard 

 joinerwork and delicate textile, to equalize the strain. 



Pandanus. — Of many uses in Malaysian basketry. (See Haeckel, 

 India and Ceylon, N. Y., 1883, p. 99.) 



The pandanus {Pandanus odoratissimus) belongs to the most singular char- 

 acter of plants of the Tropics. It is closely allied to the palms, and is also 

 called screw-palm, or, more improperly, screw-pine. The low cylindrical stem, 

 which grows from 20 to 40 feet high, is twisted, and branched like a candela- 

 brum ; at the extremity of every branch grows a thick tuft of large sword- 

 shape leaves similar t<> those of the dracsena and the yucca. Some of the leaves 

 are a light green, others a much darker hue: they are gracefully twisted, and 

 their spiral arrangement around the stem gives it the appearance of a perfectly 

 regular screw. From the base of every tuft hangs a cluster of white, deli- 

 riously fragrant flowers, or a large red fruit like the anona. But the plant's 

 most remarkable feature is the slender adventitious roots, which give it the 

 appearance of walking on stilts. A clump of pandanus trees offers a fantastic 

 sight as the stems rise on their stilts above the lower shrubbery or stalk about 

 over the rocks along the shore. 



