THE PINE-APPLE. 



453 



weight of 57 cwts., proving incontestably that pine-apple fibre possesses 

 strength for cordage as well as fineness for textile fabrics. 



The pine-apple grows in great abundance in the Philippine Islands, 

 but produces only a small dry fruit. We require, however, more pre- 

 cise information to enable us to determine whether this is actually the 

 plant escaped from cultivation. Mr. Perrotet, of Pondicherry, con- 

 siders it a distinct species, and has named it Bromelia pigna, from the 

 Spanish name pigna, or pina, signifying a cone. 



In preparing the fibre for weaving, the fruit is not allowed to ripen 

 early ; its removal causes the leaves to increase considerably both in 

 length and in breadth. A woman places a board on the ground, and 

 upon it a leaf with the hollow side upwards. Sitting at one end of 

 the board, she holds the leaf *firmly with her toes, and scrapes its outer 

 surface with a potsherd, not with the sharp fractured edge, but with 

 the blunt side of the rim ; and thus the leaf is reduced to rags. In 

 this manner a stratum of coarse longitudinal fibre is disclosed, and 

 the operator, placing her thumb-nail beneath it, lifts it up and draws 

 it away in a compact strip; after which she scrapes again until a 

 second fine layer of fibre is laid bare. Then turning the leaf round, 

 she scrapes its back, which now lies upwards, down to the layer of 

 fibre, which she seizes with her hand and draws at once, to its full 

 length, away from the back of the leaf. When the fibre has been 

 washed, it is dried in the sun. It is afterwards combed with a suit- 

 able comb, like women's hair, sorted into four classes, tied together, 

 and treated like the fibre of the lupi. In this crude manner are 

 obtained the threads for the celebrated web nipis de pina, which is 

 considered by experts the finest in the world. 



In the Philippines, where the fineness of the work is best understood 

 and appreciated, richly embroidered cpstumes of this description have 

 fetched about 200Z, each. 



This fine muslin-like fabric is embroidered by the nuns of the con- 

 vents in Manila with great skill and taste. Beautiful specimens of 

 this pina muslin were sent to the first London International Exhibi- 

 tion, and to subsequent Exhibitions. It is sometimes, but erroneously, 

 called grass-cloth. With a magnifier the fibres may be seen to be 

 very numerous and fine, but not twisted at all, as in grass-cloth or 

 the finest muslins and cambrics. One of the coarser fibres may be 

 subdivided into threads of such fineness as to be barely perceptible, 

 and yet sufficiently strong for any purpose. 



The manufacture of the pina fabric is carried on in the metropolitan 

 province of Tondo. From the extraordinary facility with which the 

 pine-apple is grown in the vicinity of the equator, it seems almost 

 certain that by the application of European skill to the process of 

 separating the fibre from the pulpy matter of the leaf, a valuable raw 

 material composed of it might be obtained for the factories of Europe. 

 The fibre by the hackling process could be rendered fit for the finest 

 fabrics. The leaf consists of two diff'erent structures : the upper side, 

 being of a soft or pulpy character, easy of removal ; and the under 

 side, of a harder or more ligneous nature, and more difficult to 

 separate. These two external bodies hold the fibre between them. 



In the Straits Settlements the Chinese labourers have taken kindly 



