Cocoa-palm. — Bread-fruit. — Plantain. i o i 



subsistence to the Inhabitants, is the Pandanus Melori, of the 

 family of the PandaneDs, the fruit of which (Melori or Caldevia 

 of the Portuguese, the Larohm of the natives) supplies the 

 place of rice and Indian corn, neither of which are grown on 

 the island, owing to the ignorance of the islanders of the 

 principles of cultivation, although the nature of the soil seems 

 eminently suited to the production of both. From the huge 

 fruit of this Pandanus, a species of bread is prepared, very 

 similar to apple marmalade, which is eaten by the natives 

 along with the soft white kernel of the ripe cocoa-nut. The 

 leaves are prepared as mats of every sort and descrij^tion, 

 and are occasionally used for the manufacture of sails. 



The Bread-fruit tree [Podocarpus incisa), which furnishes 

 such excellent nutriment, that, according to Cook,* three 

 trees suffice to support a man during eight months, is found 

 on the" islands in single individuals, and we never happened 

 to see its fruit used by the natives. The plantain too seemed 

 but sparingly planted, although the elegant leafy green 

 canopy of this the most important and nutritious plant, after 

 the cocoa-nut, requires but little care in cultivation. The 

 sugar-cane, the muscat-nut tree [Myristia 3Ioschatea), and the 

 Cardamum Elettaria,'\ grow and flourish on most of the 



• * " If an inhabitant of the South Sea Islands have planted during his life but ten 

 bread-fruit trees," says Cook, " he has fulfilled his duties towards his own and his 

 grand-children as fully and effectually as the denizen of our rougher clime, who 

 during his life-long endures the severity of winter, and exhausts his energies in the 

 heats of summer, in order to provide his household with bread, and to save up 

 some trifle for his family to inherit." 



t From the Malabar word Elettari. This is the common seed so well known in 



