50 



HISTORY OF THE VEGETABLE KINGDOJI. 



cured as tlie produce of the cocoa nut tree, is in 

 some tropical regions, they are little sensible to 

 the ordinary motives which impel manlcind to 

 labour. The Reverend Mr Cordiner says, and 

 perhaps with tnith, that the person who posses- 

 ses a garden with twelve cocoa trees and two 

 jack trees, has no call to make any exertion. In 

 Sumatra the annual produce of a cocoa nut tree 

 is commonly estimated to be worth a Spanish 

 dollar. 



The husk or fibrous pericarp of the nut is 

 employed to polish furniture, and to scour the 

 floors of rooms, &c. Birds which build pendu- 

 lous nests commonly construct them of this 

 substance. Its chief use, however, is in the ma- 

 nufacture of coir, and for this purpose the nut 

 ought not to be completely ripe. The word coir 

 seems to be derived from the Latin vocable, cor- 

 ium, the skin. To remove the husk, an iron 

 spike, or sharp piece of hard wood, is fixed in 

 the ground ; the nut is then forced upon the 

 point, which passes through the fibres, thereby 

 separating the rind from the shell. In this man- 

 ner a man can clear 1000 nuts daily. Coir is 

 prepared by soaking the rind in water for several 

 months, like flax, and then beating it upon a 

 stone with a piece of heavy wood. On the coast 

 of America, when a running stream of water is 

 not near at hand, the coir-manufacturers dig holes 

 in the sand below high-water mark, and bury 

 the rind of the cocoa nut before beating it. Sub- 

 sequently it is rubbed with the hand until the 

 interstitial substance be completely separated 

 from the fibrous portion of the husk. The rind 

 of forty cocoas furnished Mr Koster with six 

 pounds weight of coir. The next operation is 

 to twist the fibres into yams, which are manu- 

 factured into cordage of all sizes. Coir is re- 

 markably buoyant, and well suited for ropes of 

 a large diameter. Until chain-cables were intro- 

 duced, all the ships which navigated the Indian 

 seas had cables made of this substance. Sea 

 water is said to be rather beneficial than hurtful 

 to it. Coir-cordage, when properly prepared, is 

 pliable, smooth, strong, and elastic: it is very 

 well suited for mnning-rigging, more especially 

 where lightness is deemed an advantage, such as 

 top-gallant studding-sail sheets, &c. On account 

 of its elasticity, seamen consider it not well 

 fitted for standing rigging. Dr Roxburgh, in 

 his observations on the comparative strength of 

 English hemp and other vegetable fibres, states, 

 that he found hemp-rope and coir-rope, when 

 large, to be respectively as 108 to eighty-seven 

 in strength, and when smaller, as sixty-five is to 

 sixty. In the same paper (Transactions of the 

 Society of Arts, Vol. ii.) he says, " Coir is cer- 

 tainly the very best material yet known for 

 cables, on account of its great elasticity and 

 strength." 



The natives sew the planks together which 



compose their boats with coir-yarns. When 

 twisted into yarns adapted for being manufac- 

 tured into cordage, it is valued in Ceylon at 

 about £2 per candy (600 lb.) Large quantities 

 of this substance are exported to the different 

 ports in India. Under the Dutch government 

 about 3,000,000 lb. were annually manufactured 

 in the island. The quantity of coir exported 

 from Ceylon in 1813, amounted to 4048^ candies, 

 and each candy may be valued at twenty-eight 

 rix dollars, total amount in rix dollars 137,649. 

 Very lately a manufactory for the making of 

 coir-cordage has been established upon a large 

 scale at Eecif, near to Pernambuco, on the coast 

 of Brazil. 



Coir is much used in India, in place of hair, to 

 stufi^ matresses, cushions for couches, saddles, &c. 

 It is also employed to make brooms and brushes 

 to white- wash houses. 



The kernel of the ripe cocoa nut is not unlike 

 the substance of an almond either in taste or 

 consistence. It is eaten by the natives, and fre- 

 quently along with jagery. The natives of the 

 Ladrone islands eat it in lieu of bread, with meat 

 and fish. Sometimes it is rasped into very small 

 pieces, and mixed with dressed rice, to give it a 

 peculiar flavour ; and occasionally it is pounded 

 into meal, of which fritters and small cakes are 

 made. In India this fruit is generally allowed 

 to be very nutritious, and many suppose that it 

 possesses the quality of inducing corpulence. 



By a little pressure the kernel may be made 

 to yield a white fluid resembling milk. When 

 the milk of cows or buffaloes cannot be procured, 

 Europeans sometimes add this liquid to tea as a 

 substitute. Another substitute for milk may be 

 obtained by rasping a kernel, and mixing the 

 scrapings with some of the liquid contained in a 

 nut. We are informed by Dr Pinckard, in his 

 Notes on the West Indies, that puddings are 

 made of cocoa-nuts in Barbadoes. A similar 

 use is made of them in Ceylon. The kernel is 

 sometimes pressed with honey and sugar, and 

 used to make preserves. 



When mature, the nut is much used in Cey- 

 lon, to furnish an oleaginous fluid required to 

 prepare a dish in very general use among all 

 ranks and classes in India, which is named Cathi/ 

 in the Singhalese and Malabar languages, An- 

 glice Curry. This word is probably derived 

 from tlie Hindoostanee vocable Qunnoo to stew. 

 For this purpose the kernel is finely rasped by 

 means of an iron instniment called hiramana, 

 which resembles the rowel of a spur, the rasp- 

 ings are washed with a small quantity of water, 

 and subsequently filtered. The emulsion thus 

 formed is boiled along with the meat, fish, or 

 vegetable substance intended to be " curried," 

 and thereby supplies the oily fluid necessary in 

 the composition of curry. A due proportion of 

 spices is added to the mixture before it is re- 



