112 
THE COCOA-NUT PALM. 
[Nature and Art, April 1, 1867. 
writers have stated, these journeys are performed 
every night. In the breeding season some time is 
spent by them in and about the salt water pools of 
the reefs, and the juvenile crabs appear to remain 
there until strong enough to seek their fortunes 
with their larger brethren amongst the diggings 
beneath the tangled roots. When the natives 
desire their capture they set resolutely to work and 
dig them out, much as the game-keepers of 
England proceed with secretive, perverse badgers. 
Unfortunately for the crabs they are good to eat, 
and are therefore ruthlessly dragged from their 
retreats, ignominiously bound with cords (a very 
necessary precaution by the bye), and carried off 
into captivity. Some of them grow to a monstrous 
size, possess nippers of the most formidable de- 
scription, and often snap the coir ropes with which 
the crab-hunters tie them, as if they were pack- 
threads. There are times when a change of diet 
appears congenial to our friend, when he levies 
indiscriminate war on all the shell-bearing molluscs 
he can lay his claws on. He extracts them from 
their snug shell castles with all the dexterity of an 
accomplished shell-fish dealer, and then, not content 
with having eaten up the tenant, he performs a sort 
of grotesque and triumphal march with the empty 
house in his claws as if for the purpose of inciting 
other crabs less nefarious in their dispositions to the 
perpetration of crimes of a like character : on the 
whole B. latro may be considered by no means a 
respectable member of the family of crabs, and 
well deserving of his name. He, however, is not 
the only robber of the grove, there are several 
species of coleopterous insects ( Oryctes Rhinoceros 
especially) whose larvse feed on the embryo leaf-buds 
of the palms and are at times exceedingly de- 
structive to the trees, not uncommonly causing 
their death. These destroyers hollow out; their 
galleries through the substance of the rolled up 
bud, and feed on the succulent young fronds 
before they expand, thereby greatly disfiguring 
them. The most generally known of these burrow- 
ing grubs is the Tucuvia or Grugru, which is about 
two inches and a half or three inches long, and 
thick in proportion. It has a hard, black head, 
and a strong pair of sliears-like jaws ; but woe be 
to the luckless colony of Grugrus which may 
chance to be revealed to the prying eye of the epi- 
curean “ black fellow.” They are not long allowed 
to pursue their mining operations, but are lugged 
forth from their retreats, and either fried crisply 
like Epping sausages in cocoa-nut oil, or with a 
little lime-juice squeezed into an empty cocoa-mit 
shell, made an extempore meal of, by firmly seizing 
the bead-like head between the finger and thumb, 
dipping the grub daintily in the lime-juice, and 
then disposing of the treat, much as we deal with a 
nicely-shelled prawn and with equal gusto. An 
ingenious method is adopted by some cocoa-mit 
growers to rid the trees of the destructive beetles ; 
a number of boys are employed to carefully search 
for the orifices in the bark ; into these, when found, 
they dexterously insert a kind of beetle-spear, 
with which each lad is provided ; this spear is a 
long, needle-shaped instrument, with one end barbed 
like the head of a diminutive arrow or double- 
bearded fishhook, and the other with a ring turned 
in it ; with this the beetles are either transfixed in 
their holes or brought forth on the barbs and 
killed. 
The cocoa-nut oil and nut trade throughout the 
Eastern and Southern seas is of great extent and 
importance. It has been estimated that the annual 
importation of merchandise at a place comparatively 
little known, except by traders (Samoa), in ex- 
change for cocoa-nuts and oil, amounts to £30,000. 
A vast number of the Polynesian and other islands 
furnish incredible quantities of both nuts and the oil 
obtained from them ; whilst in the Eastern seas, 
Ceylon, the Malabar coast, the Seyclielle Islands, 
the Mauritius, and many other islands enjoy an 
extensive trade either in one or both productions. 
A number of methods more or less primitive are had 
recourse to for the obtainment of the oil. In some 
localities the kernels of the nuts are cut up and 
boiled in large kettles, then pounded in a hollow 
tree trunk with a heavy pestle, again boiled, and on 
the- oil rising to the surface it is collected ; the 
contents of about seven nuts thus treated yield a 
quart of oil. In Ceylon and many parts of the 
East Indies the quaint contrivance represented in 
the annexed cut is made use of for crushing the nut 
kernels ; the upright portion in the centre is a sort 
of round-bottomed cylinder (not unlike a short 
cannon or mortar) hewn from a block of basalt or 
other hard and suitable stone ; in this the end of a 
heavy beam of Bauhul wood is set at an angle and 
kept constantly travelling round by the bullocks at 
the end of the yoke-piece. Well do we remember 
our first introduction to one of these contrivances, 
and the perplexity and difficulty we experienced to 
reasonably account for the unearthly shrieks and 
fiendish sounds we heard when shooting in the 
jungle. Forcing our way through the tangled 
thicket, and trailing monkey ropes, expecting to 
discover it was hard to say what ; an open space 
between the . trees was reached and the whole 
mystery was solved. We beheld a native oil-mill 
with the patient old buffaloes plodding onwards on 
their endless journey. We did not, with the head- 
long valour of Don Quixote, proceed to attack our 
mill, but sat quietly down on a stone to make a 
sketch of it, which we, in our prosaic way of 
viewing matters, thought the wiser course of the 
two. 
When the extraction of the oil is undertaken by 
merchants or European firms, ponderous iron 
machinery is erected and used to express it, when 
about two gallons and a half of oil are obtained 
from one hundred nuts. Besides that used for 
home consumption, very large quantities are ex- 
ported to England, the United States, and other 
countries, where it is made use of for a variety of 
purposes, the manufacture of soap and candles 
amongst them. A great deal of soap thus made in 
America is sent back to Polynesia to be again 
bartered for more oil. The dry cocoa-nut chip, after 
the oil is expressed, is sometimes used as a food for 
