358 A MISSION TO VITI. 



base, sixteen feet in circumference. Milne (Hook. Jour. 

 Bot. and Kew Misc. ix. p. 113) gives from eighteen to 

 twenty-seven feet circumference as the maximum, but 

 he does not state at what height above the base his 

 measurement was taken. Some of the trees at Korovono 

 were from 80 to 100 feet high, and up to a height of 

 60 feet free from branches. The bark was whitish on 

 the outer, red on the inner, surface, peeling off like that 

 of Australian gum-trees. Old specimens did not have re- 

 gular whorls of branches, as is the case with most Coni- 

 fers. The wood of the Korovono tree was white, but 

 there is said to be also a red-wooded kind, which may 

 perhaps prove distinct from this plant. Dakua is used for 

 masts, booms, and spars, for flooring houses, and for all 

 those purposes for which deal is usually employed by us. 

 Spars, from sixty to eighty feet long, and two to three 

 feet thick, were seen at Taguru, Viti Levu. The Dakua 

 is not gregarious, but found always isolated in forests of a 

 mixed composition. Like other Kowrie-pines, the Fijian 

 exudes a gum, or rather resin, called "Makadre." Lumps 

 weighing 501bs. have occasionally been found under old 

 rotten stumps ; and a good deal might be collected in 

 districts whence these trees have disappeared, if the 

 natives could be made acquainted with the peculiar way 

 in which the New Zealanders sound the ground for their 

 kowrie-gum. There has never been any foreign trade in 

 this article, because the Europeans in Fiji, ignorant of 

 its average market- value, rejected the offer of the natives 

 to collect it. Captain Dunn, an American, is said to have 

 taken away half a ton of it, but it has not transpired 

 whether he was able to dispose of it to advantage. New 



