The shells of the cocoa-nut, when fully ripe, are of a tolerable thickness, and great hardness; they are cut transversely, scraped, polished, and mounted on silver, being edged also with the same metal, and are preserved as goblets, more for curiosity than utility; but the shell is also used for cups, (elegantly carved,) lamps, ladles, skimmers, spoons, &c.; they are used by the Polynesians, as well as other natives, entire, for containing their water, having two holes on the summit. The interior of the nut is extracted without breaking the shell, by filling it with salt-water, after which it is buried for some time in the sand, when the inside pulp becomes decayed, and the shell is then well washed out. The largest nuts are chosen for the purpose, and are often seen highly polished, and of a fine black colour. The cups of the natives are usually made of sections of the cocoa-nut in that stage of ripeness, when they are denominated by the Tahitans Omutu; they are then scraped so thin as to be nearly transparent, and are of a light-brown colour. The shells will make good lamp-black, and, reduced to charcoal and pulverized, also an excellent dentifrice.
The flowers are insignificant when the magnitude of the tree is considered, and are inclosed in a thick, tough spathe, which, when either opened artificially, or when seen just expanding naturally, have a beautiful milk-white appearance. The Tahitans call the flower Tiari, a name applied generally to all flowers; and the spathe is denominated Pa tiari; Pa signifying a shell or any thing hard, sometimes applied to the shell of the cocoa-nut; and the spathe is thus considered the shell of the flowers. The first appearance of these flowers on a tree of moderate elevation (when they are well seen) has an elegant effect—the cluster erect, drooping, and delicately white. The taste of the flowers is most powerfully astringent, and in Ceylon is used medicinally in various debilitating diseases, more particularly that distressing malady in tropical climates—gonorrhœa. The mode in which it is administered is the expressed juice of the flower mixed with new milk, and taken in small quantities not exceeding a wine-glass full, but at regular periods, affords almost immediate temporary relief, and, if persevered in, effectual cure. It is from these flower spathes, before the flowers have yet expanded, that the delicious beverage, known to Europeans as toddy or palm-wine is made;[131] it is called by the Singalese Ra, and the Hindoo Portuguese Soura, but is unknown to the natives of Polynesia, although at some of the islands Europeans, who have visited those parts of India where they had seen the process of collecting it, had commenced instructing the natives, who were delighted to have a beverage possessing the stimulus of their favourite rum.
To procure the toddy[132] the spathe is tied with stripes of the milk-white leaves of the very young branches, (which are much tougher and stronger than the old ones,) to prevent its expansion; it is cut a little transversely from the top, and beaten either with the handle of the toddy knife or a small piece of ebony or iron wood; this process having been continued morning and evening (at dawn of day, and just as the sun declines below the horizon) for five or six successive days, the under part of the spathe is taken off, so as to permit of its being gradually bent, when the Chandos or toddy-drawers, for the purpose of keeping it in that position, attach it to some neighbouring branch. After a farther period of five days an earthen chatty or calabash is hung to the spathe, so as to receive the toddy that exudes, which is collected every morning and evening, and the spathe cut a little every day: the quantity collected varies much.
The toddy should be drunk at sunrise, when it is a most delicious drink, having a slightly stimulating effect, and acting as a gentle aperient, a remedy admirably adapted for constipated habits, particularly in those of delicate constitutions. The Singalese prefer it after fermentation has taken place, and with it they often intoxicate themselves. Fermentation takes place in a few hours after the toddy has been collected, and is used by the bakers as yeast, the bread made with it being remarkably light. Toddy is seldom or never used by Europeans during the rainy season, being then regarded highly unwholesome. I have often found the toddy in Ceylon, and a refreshing bath before or just on the eve of sunrise, cooling, and it braces one up to go through the heat of the day in that sultry, debilitating climate.
The spirit known in India by the name of arrack, or rack, is in several parts distilled from rice; but in Ceylon, where this spirit is named Pol, wakéré, it is distilled from toddy after it has undergone fermentation and become quite sour. One hundred gallons of toddy, it is stated, will produce, by distillation, twenty-five of arrack. Like all other spirits, when new, it is regarded injurious to the constitution, but when old, very wholesome. It is a favourite spirit among the drinkers of that far-famed English beverage, named punch.
Toddy, besides the foregoing uses, makes excellent vinegar,[133] &c. The toddy-drawers are a separate caste in Ceylon, called Chandos: almost all the families of this class reside in the neighbourhood of the sea-coast, where the trees grow in the greatest luxuriance and abundance, the whole line of coast between Point de Galle and Colombo being thickly planted with them; and the topes or groves are let at a stipulated sum of rix-dollars by the month; and it is also not uncommon for one or two families or more to have a share in a single tree, affording them sufficient for their favourite and universal food, the currie.
Besides vinegar, arrack, &c., the toddy yields abundance of jaggery or sugar. The toddy, being collected in a calabash, as before mentioned, in which a few pieces of the bark of the Allghas (Hellenia Allughas, Linn.) had been placed, a supply of sweet toddy is procured mornings and evenings; but particular care is required that the vessels be regularly changed, and that none are employed unless they have been well cleaned and dried. Eight gallons of sweet toddy, boiled over a slow fire, yield two gallons of a very luscious liquid, called Penni, or honey, or jaggery, or sugar-water; which quantity, being again boiled, a species of coarse brown sugar, called jaggery, which is formed into round cakes, and dried in the smoke of the huts; and, in order to preserve it free from humidity, each cake of jaggery is tied up in pieces of dried banana leaves, separately, and kept in smoky places, unless required for family use or the market. Jaggery is exported from Ceylon to various parts of India. In the interior a jaggery is drawn from the Kittul tree, the Caryota urens of Linnæus, and is considered to possess more saccharine properties than that produced from the Cocos nucifera. The jaggery-makers are called in Ceylon Hakuroos, and are one of the subdivisions of the second in rank of the Singalese castes.
The rind or husk of the cocoa-nut[134] is very fibrous, and, when ripe, is the Koya or Koir of commerce. It is prepared by being soaked for some months in water, washed, beaten to pieces, and then laid in the sun to dry. This being effected, it is again well beaten until the fibres are so separated as to allow of their being worked up like hemp, similar to which it is made up in ropes of any size from the smallest cord to the largest cable, but will not receive tar; it is rough to handle, and has not so neat an appearance about the rigging of shipping as that made from hemp, but surpasses the latter in lightness and elasticity, and even, it is said, durability; more so if wetted frequently by salt-water. From its elasticity it is valuable for cables, enabling a ship to ride easier than with a hemp or even chain cable. I was once on board a ship, in a severe gale, when chain and hemp cables gave way; and we, at last, most unexpectedly rode the gale out with a small coir-cable. Among the Polynesian islands, where this valuable tree rears its elegant crest, the coir is used in the manufacture of “sinnet,” some of which is beautifully braided, and used by the natives for a variety of useful purposes, and at Tahiti is called Napé. At Tonga, (one of the Friendly Islands,) the natives dye the “sinnet,” called Kafa, of various colours, using it in tying the rafters of the huts, &c. and it has a very ornamental appearance. The rope for their canvas is all manufactured from this substance. The husk, from which the fibrous substance has not been separated, is used in Ceylon in lieu of scrubbing-brushes for the floor; and also brooms, mats, and bags are manufactured from it. A quantity of coir cordage, such as cables, hawsers, &c., is exported annually from Ceylon to various parts of the globe. At the Pulowat Islands, (Carolina Group, South Pacific Ocean,) we purchased an abundance of cordage, an inch and one and a half inch in diameter, for merely pieces of iron hoop.[135]
From the trunk of the cocoa-nut tree the Tahitans extract a gummy substance, called by them Pia, pia; it possesses no fragrant property, but is used by the native females to spread over their hair, in the same manner that they are accustomed to use the viscid gum of the bread-fruit tree.
Mariner mentions the charm at the Tonga islands of Ta Niu, which consists in spinning a cocoa-nut with the husk on, and judging, by the direction of the upper part when again at rest, of the object of inquiry, which is chiefly whether a sick person will recover: for this purpose, the nut being placed on the ground, a relation of the sick person determines that if the nut, when again at rest, points to such a quarter—the east for example—the sick man will recover; he then prays aloud to the patron god of the family, that he will be pleased to direct the nut, so that it may indicate the truth. The nut being next spun, the result is attended to with confidence, at least with a full conviction that it will truly declare the intentions of the gods at the time.