COCOS NUCIFERA 237 



The ripe fruit contains a rather soft and savory meat which 

 is generally eaten mixed with the clear, sweet coco-nut milk. 

 Later the meat becomes firmer and is used as a food and an oil 

 much used in the islands is extracted from it. To extract the 

 oil the meat is grated and pressed until all the juice is ex- 

 tracted. This is called the milk and when boiled is converted 

 almost completely into oil. Cocoanut milk has an agreeable 

 taste and may in some cases take the place of cow's milk. It 

 is apt to produce diarrhoea, however, which action may be bad 

 for some but on the other hand good for others, such as the 

 habitually constipated. Both the meat and the milk are widely 

 used by the natives in making sweets. 



In the greater part of the islands it is the only oil used for 

 illumination. As a medicine it is employed internally as a 

 purgative and externally in the treatment of scores of troubles 

 in which the good results obtained are due, not to the oil but 

 to the massage used in rubbing it in. It has the reputation of 

 stimulating the growth of the hair and all the natives and some 

 Europeans use it lavishly as a hair ointment. When fresh its 

 odor is agreeable, but it easily becomes rancid and assumes a 

 most disagreeable odor. In the Visayan Islands they make an 

 oil of a nauseous odor which they call in Manila Caracoa. It 

 is used only for illumination and by the poor. 



At a temperature of 20 or more the oil remains liquid ; it 

 is colorless when fresh and properly extracted. It solidifies at 

 18 and two kinds of soap are made of it; one soft and ex- 

 ceedingly cheap called " Quiapo " ; the other hard, white, of a 

 high quality, but as a rule containing an excess of lime which 

 in time is deposited in a fluorescent film on its surface. 



In India the root is employed in the treatment of dysentery. 



BOTANICAL DESCRIPTION. A tree most familiar to every 

 one. 



HABITAT. Common in all parts of the Archipelago. 



