rom the cable of the great pattimar, now getting
under weigh for the Persian Gulf with a cargo of coconuts, to the
painter of the dugout, "hodee," every yard of cordage about them is made
of imperishable coir.

When the axe is at last laid to the old coconut tree, a beam will fall
to the earth sixty feet in length, hard as teak and already rounded and
smoothed. True, you cannot saw it into planks, but no one will complain
of that in a village which does not own a saw. It cleaves readily enough
and straightly, forming long troughs most useful for leading water from
the well to the plantation and for many other purposes. It can also be
chopped into lengths suitable for the ridge poles of the hut, or for
bridges to span the deep ditches which drain the rice fields or feed the
salt pans. When out in quest of snipe I have sometimes had to choose
between crossing by one of those bridges, innocent of even a handrail,
and wading through the black slough of despond which it spanned.
Choosing neither, I went home, but the "Kolee" and the "Agree" trip over
them like birds, balancing household chattels on their steady heads.

We must not think, however, of the trunk as, at the best, anything more
than a by-product of the coconut tree, whose head is more than its body.
Even while it lives its head is shorn once a year, for, as fresh fronds
push out and upward from the centre, those of the outer circle get old
and must be cut away. And when one of those feathery, fern-like fronds,
toying with the breeze, comes crashing to the ground, it is ten or
twelve feet long, and consists of a great backbone, as thick at the base
as a man's leg, with a close-set row of swords on either side, about a
yard in length. They are hard and tough, but supple yet and of a shiny
green colour; but they will turn to brown as they wither.

Now observe that this gigantic, unmanageable-looking leaf, like
everything else about the coconut tree, is almost a ready-made article,
demanding no machinery to turn it to account, except the "koita" which
hangs ever ready from the nude man's girdle. With it he will cleave the
backbone lengthwise, and then, taking each half separately, he will
simply twist backwards every second sword and plait them all into a mat
two feet wide, eight or ten feet long, and firmly bounded and held
together on one side by the unbreakable backbone. This is a "jaolee,"
lighter than slates, or tiles, and more handy than any form of thatch.
Y