VISITING THE GARDENS 189 



machines, concertinas, and spelling-books. In 

 Museums I. and II. our young friends may 

 see what delicate and finely tinted cloth those 

 islanders could beat out of bark before they 

 learned to depend too much on our manufactures, 

 being often more healthy and moral without 

 the encumbering garments which the early 

 missionaries considered essential to godliness. 



For some islands of the South Seas, the 

 pandanus, rather, fills the part of universal 

 provider. The same thing might be said of 

 other trees in their different regions ; but perhaps 

 enough has been said on this head, when one 

 mentions the Brazilian wax -palm (Copernicia 

 cerifera), which, though it makes no great show 

 here, according to Mr. J. W. Wells, seems to 

 be as much of a tree-of-all-work as any other 

 in the world. 



It resists intense and protracted droughts, and is 

 always green and vigorous ; it produces an equivalent to 

 sarsaparilla ; a nutritious vegetable like cabbage; wine; 

 vinegar ; a saccharine substance ; a starch, resembling 

 and equivalent to sago ; other substances resemble, or by 

 processes are made to substitute maizena, coffee, cork, 

 wax, salt, alkali, and coco-nut milk ; and from its various 

 materials are manufactured wax-candles, soap, mats, hats, 

 musical instruments, water-tubes, pumps, ropes, and cords, 

 stakes for fences, timber for joists, rafters, and other 



