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E ooroo. Sitodium-altile.
This tree, which yields the bread-fruit so often mentioned by the voyagers to the South-seas, may justly be stiled the Staff-of-life to these islanders; for from it they draw most of their support. This tree grows to between thirty and forty feet high, has large palmated leaves, of a deep grass-green on the upper-side, but paler on the under; and bears male and female flowers, which come out single at the bottom or joint of each leaf. The male flower fades and drops off; the female, or cluster of females, swell and yield the fruit, which often weighs three or four pounds, and is as big as a person’s head when full grown. It is of a green colour; the rind is divided into a number of polygonical sections; the general shape a little longer than round, and white on the inside, with a pretty large core. The fruit, as well as the whole plant, is full of a white clammy juice, which issues plentifully from any part that is cut: it delights in a rich soil, and seldom grows, if ever, on the low islands: it is a very handsome tree to look at, of a beautiful verdure, and well cloathed with leaves, bearing a vast quantity of fruit, which appears to hang in bunches, and, by its great weight, bends down the branches: it bears fruit a great part of the year, and there are several sorts of it, some smaller and others larger, which are ready to pluck at different seasons. They generally pluck it before it is ripe, using a long stick with a fork at the end of it for this purpose; and, before they roast it, scrape all the rind off with a shell; and then, when large, cut it in quarters; and, having prepared one of their ovens in the ground, with hot stones in it, they lay the fruit upon these, having previously put a layer of the leaves between, and then another layer over them, and, above that, more hot stones, covering up the whole close with earth, and, in two or three hours time, it is done; it then appears very inviting, more so than the finest loaf I ever saw; the inside is very white, and the outside a pale brown; it tastes very farinaceous, and is, perhaps, the most agreeable and best succedaneum for bread ever yet known, and, in many respects, exceeds it. When thus baked, it only keeps three or four days, another contrivance being used for keeping it; they take the baked fruit, cut out all the cores, and, with a stone-mallet, mash it to a pulp in a wooden trough or tray. This pulp they put in a hole that is dug in the ground and lined with leaves; this is close covered up, and left a proper time till it ferments and becomes sour; at which time they take it up, and make it into little loaves, which they wrap up in the leaves, and, in this state, it is baked, and called by them mahe, and and will keep several months, being eaten when bread-fruit is out of season, and carried to sea with them; and of it they form several sorts of paste, such as pepe, popoee, &c. which are used by them at their meals. The leaves of this tree are very useful to wrap fish and other eatables in, when put into the oven to be baked. Of the wood they build canoes, and make several other sorts of utensils; and, of the bark of young plants of it, which are raised on purpose, they make very good cloth, which is but little inferior to that made of Eaowte, only somewhat more harsh and harder.
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© Derived from the London 1773 edition printed for Stanfield Parkinson, page 45, 2004
Published by kind permission of the Library
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