410 TAHITI. [car. xvrit- 
on the burning wood. In about ten minutes the sticks were 
consumed, and the stones hot. They had previously folded up 
in small parcels of leaves, pieces of beef, fish, ripe and unripe 
bananas, and the tops of the wild arum. These green parcels 
were laid in a layer between two layers of the hot stones, and 
the whole then covered up with earth, so that no smoke or steam 
could escape. In about a quarter of an hour, the whole was 
most deliciously cooked. The choice green parcels were now 
Jaid on a cloth of banana leaves, and with a cocoa-nut shell we 
drank the cool water of the running stream ; and thus we enjoyed 
our rustic meal. 
I could not look on the surrounding plants without admira- 
tion. On every side were forests of banana; the fruit of which, 
though serving for food in various ways, lay in heaps decaying 
on the ground. In front of us there was an extensive brake of 
wild sugar-cane; and the stream was shaded by the dark green 
knotted stem of the Ava,—so famous in former days for its 
powerful intoxicating effects. I chewed a piece, and found that 
it had an acrid and unpleasant taste, which would have induced 
any one at once to have pronounced it poisonous. Thanks to 
the missionaries, this plant now thrives only in these deep ra- 
vines, innocuous to every one. Close by I saw the wild arum, 
the roots of which, when well baked, are good to eat, and the 
young leaves better than spinach. There was the wild yam, and 
a liliaceous plant called Ti, which grows in abundance, and has a 
soft brown root, in shape and size like a huge leg of wood: this 
served us for dessert, for it is as sweet as treacle, and with a 
pleasant taste. There were, moreover, several other wild fruits, 
and useful vegetables. The little stream, besides its cool water, 
produced eels and cray-fish. I did indeed admire this scene, 
when I compared it with an uncultivated one in the temperate 
zones. I felt the force of the remark, that man, at least savage 
man, with his reasoning powers only partly developed, is the 
child of the tropics. 
As the evening drew to a close, I strolled beneath the gloomy 
shade of the bananas up the course of the stream. My walk was 
soon brought to a close, by coming to a waterfall between two 
and three hundred feet high; and again above this there was 
another. I mention all these waterfalls in this one brook, to 
