256 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 



pressed together between two supporting sticks, and closed 

 up completely with clay. To keep the ends still better 

 secured against opening, a wooden pin is driven through the 

 two thicknesses of bark at each end. The vessel so formed 

 is 2 ft. 6 in. in length, 8 in. in width at the centre where it 

 is most bulged, and 6 in. deep. Each pair of the four sticks 

 forming its supports, is tied together. The lower ends of 

 these are stuck in the ground, and they are about 4 ft. in 

 total height, but the bottom of the cooking vessel is barely 

 18 in. from the ground. It has internally a strip of wood 

 lengthwise on bottom, and three or four cross ribs formed 

 of twigs to keep it from shrinking. Externally it is a good 

 deal charred, and so are two of the supports. It is uncertain 

 what kind of food is cooked in these vessels, but the shells of 

 fresh-water mussels were found lying about around the huts. 

 The bark has nothing in its composition specially fitting it 

 for withstanding heat, as its ash is composed of alkaline 

 carbonates, and it mil char and get brittle at the same 

 temperature as many other barks. Just as water can be 

 boiled in paper over a gas-flame if the paper be covered with 

 water where the heated air strikes it, so, perhaps, the fibre of 

 this bark is such as to retain moisture and conduct heat after 

 it has become well soaked in water. In this way, when con- 

 taining liquid, it would stand for a time the heat of a fire just 

 as a paper vessel filled with water does that of a lamp or gas , 

 jet. Cooking vessels, even of wood, are rare among savage 

 tribes. The natives of Vancouver Island appear to have used 

 them, and it is rather singular that in the neighbouring group 

 of islands to the Nicobars, the Andamanese have a method 

 of cooking food in a bamboo vessel. A cell of the bamboo 

 containing the food is placed on a fire and constantly turned 

 so that all parts are equally exposed to the heat. The vessel 

 is only capable of being used once, and the food is taken out 

 by splitting it. The bamboo has a solid siliceous substance 

 in the joints of the stem which probably helps it to with- 

 stand the action of the fire. 



2. An earthenware cooking pot of a reddish colour and 

 coated on the outside with some kind of varnish. It is circular 

 in shape, with straight sides and a hemispherical bottom ; and 



