1769 DYEING CLOTH 151 



stalks of it through their teeth, or between two little sticks 

 until all the green bark and the bran-like substance which 

 lies between them is gone. In a covering of these fibres, 

 then, they envelop the leaves, and squeezing or wringing 

 them strongly, express the dye, which turns out very little 

 more in quantity than the liquor employed ; this operation 

 they repeat several times, as often soaking the leaves in the 

 dye and squeezing them dry again, until they have suffi- 

 ciently extracted all their virtue. They throw away the 

 remaining leaves, keeping however the mooo, which serves 

 them instead of a brush to lay the colour on the cloth. 

 The receptacle used for the liquid dye is always a plantain 

 leaf, whether from any property it may have suitable to 

 the colour, or the great ease with which it is always 

 obtained, and the facility of dividing it, and making of it 

 many small cups, in which the dye may be distributed to 

 every one in the company, I do not know. In laying the 

 dye upon the cloth, they take it up in the fibres of the 

 mooo, and rubbing it gently over the cloth, spread the out- 

 side of it with a thin coat of dye. This applies to the 

 thick cloth : of the thin they very seldom dye more than 

 the edges ; some indeed I have seen dyed through, as if it 

 had been soaked in the dye, but it had not nearly so elegant 

 a colour as that on which a thin coat only was laid on the 

 outside. 



Though the etou leaf is the most generally used, and I 

 believe produces the finest colour, yet there are several 

 more, which by being mixed with the juice of the little figs 

 produce a red colour. Such are Tournefortia sericea (which 

 they call taheino), Convolvulus brasiliensis, Solanum latifolium 

 (ebooa). By the use of these different plants or of different 

 proportions of the materials many varieties of the colour 

 are observable among their cloths, some of which are very 

 conspicuously superior to others. 



When the women have been employed in dyeing cloth, 

 they industriously preserve the colour upon their fingers 

 and nails, upon which it shows with its greatest beauty ; 

 they look upon this as no small ornament, and I have been 



