efully preserve the colour upon
their fingers and nails, where it appears in its utmost beauty, as a
great ornament.

The yellow is made of the bark of the root of the _morinda citrifolia_,
called _nono_, by scraping and infusing it in water; after standing some
time, the water is strained and used as a dye, the cloth being dipped
into it. The morinda, of which this is a species, seems to be a good
subject for examination with a view to dyeing. Brown, in his History of
Jamaica, mentions three species of it, which he says are used to dye
brown; and Rumphius says of the _bancuda angustifolia_, which is nearly
allied to our nono, that it is used by the inhabitants of the East
Indian islands as a fixing drug for red colours, with which it
particularly agrees.

The inhabitants of this island also dye yellow with the fruit of the
tamanu; but how the colour is extracted, we had no opportunity to
discover. They have also a preparation with which they dye brown and
black; but these colours are so indifferent, that the method of
preparing them did not excite our curiosity.

Another considerable manufacture is matting of various kinds; some of
which is finer, and better, in every respect, than any we have in
Europe; the coarser sort serves them to sleep upon, and the finer to
wear in wet weather. With the fine, of which there are also two sorts,
much pains is taken, especially with that made of the bark of the
poerou, the _hibiscus tiliaceus_ of Linnaeus, some of which is as fine as
a coarse cloth: The other sort, which is still more beautiful, they call
vanne; it is white, glossy, and shining, and is made of the leaves of
their _wharrou_, a species of the _pandanus_, of which we had no
opportunity to see either the flowers or fruit: They have other matts,
or, as they call them, _moeas_, to sit or to sleep upon, which are
formed of a great variety of rushes and grass, and which they make, as
they do every thing else that is plaited, with amazing facility and
dispatch.

They are also very dexterous in making basket and wicker-work; their
baskets are of a thousand different patterns, many of them exceedingly
neat; and the making them is an art that every one practises, both men
and women; they make occasional baskets and panniers of the cocoa-nut
leaf in a few minutes, and the women who visited us early in a morning
used to send, as soon as the sun was high, for a few of the leaves, of
which they made little bonnets to shade th