NATIONAL BEVERAGES. 329 
Some people have drunk a decoction of its leaves with- 
out perceiving it to be different from Chinese tea. 
There is another negative fact of singular ethnolo- 
gical importance connected with this subject. Neither 
the Fijians nor the Polynesians in general were ac- 
quainted with the art of extracting toddy from the un- 
expanded flowers of the cocoa-nut palm. It is only 
in quite recent times that Europeans have instructed 
them init. This, ina great measure, seems to strengthen 
the position of those who maintain that the Polyne- 
sians did not come from the Malayan or any other dis- 
trict of Asia; that they would never have migrated con- 
trary to the direction of the prevailing trade-winds ; and 
that the identity of certain Malayan and Polynesian 
words, thought to be an overpowering argument in 
favour of that exodus, cuts both ways, and may be made 
to prove either that these words came from purely Ma- 
layan to Polynesian districts, or from a genuine Polyne- 
sian to a Malayan; and exactly the same dilemma is 
encountered in dealing with the geographical distribu- 
tion of Polynesian plants and animals. Passionately 
fond as are the Polynesians of intoxicating drinks, they 
would never have discontinued making toddy, if they 
had ever known the way to make it, especially as a tree 
yielding it, the cocoa-nut palm, is common throughout 
Polynesia. In order to reconcile this fact with the hy- 
pothesis that the Polynesians are of Malayan origin, it 
might be assumed that they left the cradle of their 
race before the extraction of toddy from the cocoa-nut 
tree, or even the cocoa-nut tree itself, was known there. 
Tradition, historical evidence, and observed facts, all 
