Mexican Stone Beaters. 201 



Thus equipped, they were conducted on board the ship, together with several hogs 

 and a quantity of fruit, which with the cloth was a present to me from Otoo's father. 

 Persons of either sex dressed in this manner are called atee ; but I believe it is never 



practised except when large presents of ■ cloth are to be made Both Captain 



Gierke and I had cloth given to us afterward thus wrapped round the bearers." '^ 



Before closing this brief notice of the ancient uses of Hawaiian kapa, I must 

 notice the modern use (which seems increasing) of the cheap Samoan stamped siapo, 

 as a material for wall decoration and for covering books. The pleasing brown color 

 and rather fantastic designs make suitable wall hangings for rustic bungalow or 

 porches protected from the wind. For book covers the varnished varieties are more 

 desirable, and will be found fairly durable. 



It would have been well to insert the following information about the stone 

 beaters of IMexico as an appendix to the chapter on Implements, but at the time that 

 chapter was written I was ignorant of the existence of such beaters : only in Africa had 

 I read of stone as a substitute for wood in this manufadlure. I had also not looked 

 into the use of bark-cloth in South America, although I have in my colleAion a thick 

 and stiff fragment attributed to that large portion of the American continent without 

 more definite information. The Indian tribes on the banks of the Amazon and the 

 Orinoco certainly had ample material at their hand for making good cloth and for 

 dyeing it as well, but the specimens that have come to my knowledge add nothing to 

 the stor}-- of Hawaiian or Polynesian kapa-making. 



Stone Kapa Beaters. — Although we have no record of stone kapa beaters 

 ever having been in use in Polynesia, they were certainly in use in very ancient 

 times in Mexico as well as on the Asiatic continent, and it is- curious that the Mexi- 

 can implements closely resembled the universal Polynesian form so far as the patterns 

 of the striking surface are concerned. Since the note on page 113 was in print 

 Reverend W. D. Westervelt has brought from Mexico and given to this Museum 

 specimens of the stone face of the beaters used like the beaters in Japan to make 

 paper as such and not the variety of felted vegetable fibre known as kapa and used 

 as cloth rather than as paper. 



When Cortez entered Mexico after his wonderful march through the Guate- 

 maltecan forests he found an extensive literature of painted books made of paper 

 beaten from the fibre of aloe or agave, and the very few of these that escaped the 

 destroying hands of the Spanish priests are, like the painted tombs of the kings and 

 nobles of ancient Egypt, a record of domestic arts and life. The very hierogl5'phs, 



"Cook, III Voyage, ii, 50. 



