. we have in Europe; that which approaches neareft is
our full fcarlet, and the belt imitation which Mr. Banks’s natural
hiftory painter could produce, was by a mixture of vermilion
and carmine. The yellow is alfp a bright colour, but
we have many as good.
The red colour is produced by the mixture o f the juices of
two vegetables, neither of which feparately has the lead tendency
to that hue. One is a fpecies of fig called here Matte,
and the other the Cardin Sebefiina, or Eton; of the fig the fruit
is ufed, and of the Cardia the leaves.
The fruit of the fig is about as big as a rounceval pea, or
very fmall goofeberry; and each o f them, upon breaking off
the ftalk very ciofe, produces one drop of a milky liquor, re-
fembling the juice of our figs, of which die tree is indeed
a fpecies. This liquor the women colled! into a fmall quantity
of cocoa-nfit water: to prepare a gill o f cocoa-nut water
will require between three and four quarts o f thefe little
figs. When a fufficient quantity is prepared, the leaves of the
Eton are well wetted in it, and then laid upon a plantain leaf,
where they arc turned about till they become more and more
flaccid, and then they are gently fqueezed, gradually increasing
the prefiure, but fo as not to break them; as the flacct-
dity increafes, and they become fpungy, they are fupplied
with more of the liquor; in about five minutes the colour
begins to appear upon the veins of the leaves,, and in about
ten or a little more, they are perfectly faturated with k :
they are then fijueezed, with as much force as earn be applied,
and the liquor foamed at the fame time that it is ex-
prefled.
Eor this pnrpofe, the boys prepare a large quantity of the
Moo, by drawing it between their teeth, or two little flicks,
till it isffreed from the green bark and the branny fubftance
4 that
that lies under it, and a thin web of the fibres only remains; . ^ ,
in this the leaves of the Etou are inveloped, and through
thefe the juice which they contain is ftrained as it is forced
out. As the leaves are not fucculent, little more juice is-preffed
out of them than they have imbibed: when they have been
once emptied,, they are filled again, and again preffed, till the
quality which tinctures the liquor as it paffes through them
is exbaufted, they are then thrown away; but the Moo,,
being deeply ftaimed with the colour, is preferved, as abruflv
to lay the dye upon the cloth.
The expreffed liquor is always received into fmall cups-
made o f the plantain leaf, whether from a notion that it has-
any quality favourable to- the colour, or from the facility
with which it is procured, and the convenience of fmall vef-
fels to diftribute it among, the artificers, I do not know.
Of the thin cloth they feldom dye more than the edges,,
but the thick cloth is coloured through the whole • furface;
the liquor is indeed ufed rather as a pigment than a-dye, for
a coat of it is laid upon one fide only, with the fibres of the
Moo -r and: though I have feen of the thin cloth that has
appeared to have been foaked in the liquor, the colour has
not had the fame richnefs and luftre, as when it has been-
applied in tlie other manner.-
Though the leaf of the Etou is generally ufed in this p ^
cefs, and probably produces the fineft colour; yet the juice
of the figs will produce a red by a mixture with the fpecies-
©f Tournefortia, which they call Taheinm the Rohuc, the
Eurbe or Convolvulus Brqfilienfis, and a fpecies o f Solanum
called Ebooa-,. from the ufe o f thefe different plants, or from;
different proportions of the materials, many varieties are
obfervable in the colours of. their cloth, fome of which are-
confpicuoufly fuperior to others*
The