THROUGH HAWAII. 
95 
that may sprout out from the side of the long shoot, 
are carefully plucked off, and sometimes the bud at the 
top of the plant is pulled out, to cause an increase in 
its size. Occasionally they are two years growing, and 
seldom reach the size at which they are fit for use, in 
less than twelve or even eighteen months, when they 
are cut off near the ground, the old roots being left, to 
produce shoots another year. 
The bark, when stripped off and rolled up, as de¬ 
scribed above, is left several days; when, on being un¬ 
rolled, it appears quite flat. The outer bark is then 
taken off, generally by scraping it with a large shell, 
and the inner bark, of which the cloth is made, is occa¬ 
sionally laid in water, to extract the resinous sub¬ 
stances it may contain. Each piece of bark is then 
taken singly, and laid across a piece of wood, twelve 
or eighteen feet long, six inches square, smooth on the 
top, but having a groove on the under side, and is 
beaten with a square mallet of hard heavy wood, about 
a foot in length, and two inches wide; three sides are 
carved in grooves or ribs, the other into squares, in 
order that one mallet may answer for the different kinds 
of cloth they are accustomed to make. When they 
have beaten the bark till it is spread out nine inches or 
a foot wide, it is either dried and reserved for future 
use, or wrapped up in leaves, laid by for a day or two, 
and then beaten out afresh till the required extent and 
texture are produced. 
Various sorts of cloth are made with this plant, some 
remarkably fine and even; that which has been beaten 
with a mallet, carved in different patterns, much re¬ 
sembles muslin at first sight, while that made with a 
grooved mallet appears, until closely examined, some- 
