32 



THE POPULAE EDUCATOR. 



Fig. 3. 



heat and contact with foreign substances, it possesses an agree- 

 ably sweet taste, and is extremely cool and refreshing. In a 

 few hours, however, a change takes place, and a sharp, agree- 

 able, acid flavour is established. This acid condition rapidly 

 progresses, and in twenty-four hours the sap becomes perfectly 

 sour. 



Most of our readers will be familiar with, at least, the name 

 of a drink held in high esteem during the past generation. 

 " Hack punch ' ' owed both its name and peculiar flavour to 

 arrack, a spirit distilled from the sweet sap obtained by the 

 toddy man. Vinegar of excellent quality is made from the sour 

 sap, by treating it, in earthen pots or jars, with the fruit of the 

 gamboge-tree and the seed-vessels of the Indian horse-radish 

 ( Hypertanthera 

 meringa). 



" Jaggery," or 

 palm sugar 

 largely exported 

 and extensively 

 used for home 

 consumption 

 is made from 

 the sap before 

 the acid change 

 takes place. It 

 is simply boiled 

 to a thick syrup 

 on quick - lime, 

 cr y st alliaed 

 roughly in round 

 monlds,placedto 

 dry, and either 

 sold to the con- 

 sumer or dis- 

 patched to the 

 port of ship- 

 ment. 



The fruit, or 

 cocoa-nuts, are, 

 according to 

 their state of 

 development, 

 consumed in an 

 almost endless 

 number of ways. 

 The unripe and 

 green nut not 

 only contains a 

 most delicious 

 store of cool 

 drink, but a 

 good supply of 

 vegetable llanc- 

 mange, which 

 can be scooped 

 out with a sea- 

 shell and eaten 

 in the grove. As 

 the nut pro- 

 gresses towards maturity an entirely different description of 

 food is found within it, and as the kernel hardens it is not un- 

 frequently mixed with mashed taro root (Arum esculentum) , 

 and made into a sort of pudding, which is baked in native earth 

 ovens, and constitutes a very palatable and wholesome article 

 of diet. 



The trade in cocoa-nuts and cocoa-nut oil carried on between 

 some of the Pacific islands and more civilised nations is of con- 

 siderable commercial importance. We learn that the island of 

 Samoa alone furnished in one year cocoa-nuts to the value of 

 <30,000, which were exchanged for various useful articles of 

 trade and barter. Many islands of the Polynesian group, the 

 island of Ceylon, the Seychelle Islands, and the Malabar coast 

 all furnish their quota of nuts or oil. 



The manufacturer of oil possessed of capital and European 

 appliances makes use of costly and massive machinery for 

 crushing the nut kernels and expelling the oil. The native oil- 

 man contents himself with a very primitive plan. He obtains 

 a large block of hard stone, hollows it out like a short cannon, or 



Fig. 1. 



rather mortar, makes a vent or touch-hole in it, sets it mouth 

 upward in the earch; fixes a pestle of very harr 1 and massive 

 wood obliquely in it ; to this he lashes <* sort of beam or boom 

 with raw hide ; he then harnesses a couple ot bullocks to the 

 boom end, and as they travel round in their endless track the 

 nut kernel is crushed and the oil flows out through the touch- 

 hole into a pot placed in a pit for its reception. Other natives 

 merely boil the pieces of kernel scooped from the nut in water, 

 and as the circlets of oil rise to the surface they are skimmed 

 off with a mussel shell set in the end of a split stick. 



A very supporting kind of food is made from the kernel thus 

 deprived of its oil, by pounding it fine, beating it into a mass, 

 enveloping it in cloths of cocoa-fibre, and placing the packs thus 



formed under 

 stones to soak in 

 sea- water. 



No part of the 

 cocoa - palm is 

 without its use. 

 Some of the uses 

 of the nut and 

 sap we have en- 

 deavoured to de- 

 scribe. The tim- 

 ber, under the 

 name of porcu- 

 pine wood, is ex- 

 tensively used 

 for canoe-build- 

 ing and the 

 manufacture of 

 water pipes, 

 clubs, paddles, 

 posts for houses, 

 beams for roofs, 

 rafters, etc. ; the 

 mid ribs of the 

 leaves make ex- 

 cellent baskets ; 

 the leaflets are 

 split,plaited,and 

 made into hats ; 

 pieces of leaf, 

 with the leaflets, 

 are often used to 

 count numbers 

 and prayers on, 

 and memoranda 

 and accounts are 

 written on their 

 surfaces with a 

 stilus. An en- 

 tire leaf is used 

 as an emblem of 

 authority. Tied 

 in bundles the 

 leaves are placed 

 round the palms, 

 so that their 



rustling may give notice of the movements of any person endea- 

 vouring to stealthily ascend the tree. Excellent torches are 

 made from bundles of cocoa leaves. Hope cordage, mats, 

 twine, nets, and fishing lines are made from the coir, or cocoa 

 fibre. Good black dye is made from cocoa-nut milk. Cocoa- 

 nut gum, or pia-pia, is much used as a dressing for the hair. 

 Both cocoa-nut palm flowers and root are held in high esteem 

 as medicines. The burnt kernel yields good lamp-black, and 

 the nut-shells make convenient drinking cups and water bottles. 

 " The Indian's nut nlone 



Is clothing, meat and trencher, drink'and can, 

 Boat, cable, sail and needle all in one." 



Music is not lacking to complete the list of the gifts of the 

 good palm, for from the fibres of the leaflets are constructed 

 aeolian harps, which are either placed about the huts of the 

 palm-growers, or on the bows of the sea-going canoes ; so that 

 as they plough their way through the curling and white-capped 

 waves with their palm stores, the brisk sea breeze sings merrily, 

 and cheers the hardy islander on his way. 



Fig. 2. 



