POLYNESIA 197 



Barclay, of Burryhill, in 1829. On Mr. Barclay's death, 

 one of these two plants was purchased by the Duke of 

 Devonshire, and was grown and propagated at Chats worth, 

 where it flowered under Paxton's care in November 1836. 

 Mr. A. B. Lambert in the same month exhibited at a meet- 

 ing of the Linnean Society a copy of an old Chinese drawing 

 which, he believed, referred to the same species, and named 

 it M usa Cavendishii. Paxton, in the Magazine of Botany 

 for 1837 (p. 51), gives a coloured plate and a description 

 of the Chatsworth plant, and adopted Lambert's name. 

 John Williams, "the martyr of Eromanga," brought 

 suckers of this plant from Chatsworth to Samoa, whence 

 again, in 1848, the Rev. Geo. Pritchard carried it to the 

 Friendly Islands as well as to Fiji. " Its introduction," 

 according to Seemann, " has put an effectual stop to those 

 famines which previously to this event were occasionally 

 experienced in some of these islands. Never attaining any 

 greater height than six feet, and being of robust growth, 

 this banana is but little affected by the violent winds 

 which damage the taller kinds, and this advantage coupled 

 with its abundant yield and the fine flavour of its fruit have 

 induced the natives to propagate it to such an extent that, 

 notwithstanding its comparatively recent introduction, the 

 4 Vudi ni papalagi ' numbers amongst the most common 

 bananas of the country. The fruit of the different Musas 

 is variously prepared by the native cooks. Split in half, 

 and filled with grated coco -nut and sugar-cane, bananas 

 make a favourite pudding, which, on account of its good- 

 ness and rich sauce of coco -nut milk, has found its way 

 even into the kitchen of the white settlers. The fresh 

 Musa leaves are used as substitutes for plates and dishes 

 in serving food, or for making temporary clothing ; the 

 dry leaves instead of paper for cigarettes. In place of the 

 finger-glasses handed round at our tables after dinner, 

 Fijians of rank are supplied with portions of the leaf-stalk 

 of the plantain not a superfluous luxury in a country 

 where forks are dispensed with except at cannibal feasts." 

 In 1891 two wardian cases of suckers of the Gros Michel 



