160 NATIVE CLOTH. 
to grace the board, but yams and sweet potatoes, 
and such humble fare as has been prepared by 
the females of the family. For the women have 
their daily task to perform ; some preparing the 
ground, taking up yams, and doing other work 
requiring diligence and strength. There being 
no servants, the wives or daughters make and 
mend the clothes, and attend to all the requisite 
household affairs. 
.The women also manufacture tappa, or native 
cloth, from the bark of the Anti, or paper- 
mulberry, which is rolled up and soaked in 
water, and then beaten out with wooden mallets, 
and spread forth to dry.* This is very hard 
work. The author has in his possession a piece 
of beautifully wrought white tappa, given him 
by Mrs. Heywood, and bearing a label, which 
states that it was made by the wife of Fletcher 
Christian, from the bark of the paper-mulberry 
tree. The piece from which this portion was 
taken was entrusted by Christian's widow to 
Captain Jenkin Jones, when he visited the 
island, in her Majesty's ship Curagoa, in 1841. 
She particularly desired him to give it to Peter's 
wife. Isabella, Fletcher Christian's widow, was 
a native of Otaheite, and died, at a very advanced 
age, in September, 1841. 
The cooking is performed by the females. 
Their cooking-places are apart from their dwell- 
ings ; and there are no fire-places in any of the 
houses. Baked, not roasted, meats are the 
substantial luxuries of the table at Pitcairn. 
* For a full account of the mode of making tappa, see 
Cook's Voyage in 1777, &c. vol i, p. 201. Ed. 1784. 
