Tlie tee-plant is very extensively cultivated. Its leaves, which are
broad and oblong, are the common food of hogs and goats, anil serve
the natives for wrappers in their cooking. The root affords a very
saccharine liquor, resembling molasses, which is obtained by baking in
the ground ; it requires two or three years after it is planted to
arrive at the proper size for use, being then about two inches and a
half in diameter ; it is long, fusiform, and beset with fibres : from this
root they also make a tea, which when flavoured with ginger is not
unpleasant. The doodoe is a large tree, with a handsome blossom, and
supplies ornaments for the ears and hair, and nuts containing a considerable
quantity of oil, which, by being strung npon sticks, serve the
purpose of candles. The porou and fowtoo are trees which supply them
with fishing-lines, rope, and cord of all sorts. The tree is stripped of
the bark while the sap is in full circulation, and dried ; a fibrous substance
is then procured from it, which is twisted for use ; but it is not
strong, and is very perishable.
The cloth-tree is preeminently useful ; and here, as in all places
in the South Seas where it grows, supplies the natives with clothing.
J'he manner in which the cloth is manufactured has been frequently
described, and needs no repetition. 'J’here is, however, a fashion in the
heater, some preferring a broad, others a very closely ribbed garment ;
for which purpose they have several of these instruments with large
and small grooves. I f the cloth is required to be brown, the inner bark
of which the cloth is made is wrapped in banana leaves, and put aside
for about four days ; it is then beaten into a thick doughy substance,
and again left till fermentation is about to take place, when it is taken
out, and finally beat into a garment both lengthwise and across. The
colour thus produced is of a deep reddish brown hue. The pieces are
generally sufficiently large to wrap round the whole body, but they are
sometimes divided.
The toonena is a large tree, from which their houses and canoes
are made. It is a hard, heavy, red-coloured wood, and grows on the
upper parts of the island. There was formerly a great abundance of
this wood, but it is now become so scarce as to require considerable
search and labour to find sufficient to construct a house. 'I'he young
trees have thriven but partially, arriving at a certain growth, and then C H A I ’.
stopping. A tree of this kind, which was the largest in the island,
measured, at the time of our visit, twelve feet in circumference ; another Dec.
was nine feet seven and a half inches in girth, at five feet from the
root ; its trunk grew to the height of thirty feet, perfectly straight, and
without branching.
The banyan is one of those large spreading trees common in India.
Nature has been so provident to this island that there are very few
trees in it which cannot be turned to account in some way, and this tree,
though it yields no fruit, and produces wood so hard and heavy as to
be unserviceable, still contributes to the assistance of the islanders, by
supplying them with a resin for the seams of their boats, &c. This
useful substance is procured by perforating the bark of the tree, and
extracting the liquor which exudes through the aperture.
YVe saw dyes of three colours only in Pitcairn Island, yellow, red,
and brown. The yellow is procured from the inner bark of the root
of the nono tree ( morinda citrifolia) , and also from the root of a species
of ginger. YY"e did not see this plant growing, but it was described as
having leaves broader and longer than the common ginger, a thicker
root in proportion to its length, a darker hue, and not so tubercular.
The red dye is procured from the inner bark of the doodoe tree, and may
have its intensity varied by more or less exposure to the rays of the
sun while drying. These dyes are well coloured, but for want of proper
mordants the natives cannot fix them, and they must be renewed
every time the linen is washed. The method of producing the brown
dye has already been described.
Tlie temperate climate of Pitcairn Island is extremely favourable
to vegetation, and agriculture is attended with comparatively light
labour. But as the population is increasing, and wants are generated
which were before unthought of, the natives find it necessary to improve
their mode of culture ; and for this purpose they make use of sea-weed as
manure. They grow but one crop in a year of each kind. The time of
taking up the yams, &c. is about April. The land is not allowed time
to recover itself, but is planted again immediately. Experience has
enabled them to estimate, with tolerable precision, the quantity that
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