60 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES, 
CHAP. III. 
Varieties and appearance of the plantain and banana— 
Vi or Brazilian plum—A-hi-a or jambo—Singular 
growth of the inocarpus, or native chesnut—Different 
kinds of ti, or Dracanae—To, or sugar-cane—Foreign 
fruits and vegetables that flourish in Polynesia—Value 
of a garden in the South Sea Islands—Unsuccessful 
attempts to introduce wheat—Introduction of coffee— 
Native and foreign flowers—Tradition of the origin of the 
bread-fruit—Quadrupeds—Absence of venomous animals 
and reptiles—Manner of rearing pigs—Birds of the 
South Sea Islands—Albatross — Pigeons — Domestic 
fowls—Number and variety of fish on the coasts, and 
in the lakes and rivers. 
More rich and sweet to the taste, though far less 
serviceable as an article of food, is the rnaia , plan¬ 
tain and banana, musa paradisaica and musa 
sapientum. These are also indigenous, although 
generally cultivated in the native gardens. They 
are a rich nutritive fruit, common within the tro¬ 
pics, and so generally known as to need no parti¬ 
cular description here. There are not, perhaps, 
fewer than thirty varieties cultivated by the natives, 
besides nearly twenty kinds, very large and ser¬ 
viceable, that grow wild in the mountains. The 
orea , or maiden plantain, with the other varieties, 
comes to the highest perfection in the South Sea 
Islands, and is a delicious fruit. The stalk, or 
tree, on which these fruits grow, is seldom above 
eight or twelve feet high ; the leaves are fine broad 
specimens of the luxuriance of tropical vegetation, 
