Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1874-01-22
The Pudding Tree.

| Did you ever hear of the tree that fur
nishes us with buildings? Not the bread
fruit tree nor the cow tree, but the sage
tree. 1t grows only in the swampy lands
of hot countries, and it is almost as use.
full to the natives as the famous cocoa.
nut palm, of which you have heard so
| much.
The smaller leaves of this wonderful
tree are used for matching their bamboo
| houses, while the large ones, fifteen feet
| long (think Of leaf fifteen feet long y are
robbed of their ribs to make boards
That's tough story, isn't it? but we have
to believe good many strange things in
this world. suppose you know already
| that all leaves have ribs-that is, a stiff,
| fibrous frame to hold the soft leaf in
| place; bat this enormous leaf requires a
| principal rib as large in the thickest part
as mans leg, besides smaller ones on
each side. When cut open, this rib is
found TO be only thin, hard shell stuffed
with pith. Take out the pith, spread the
elastic shell out fiat, and you have a very
dainty boad-do you see?
| The natives sometimes build whole
house OF these delicate boards, and call
them by the graceful name of gaba gaba.
That isn't the end of wonders about
this tree. 1t just devotes all its energies
to growing tall and big till it is ten or fif-
| teen years old, and as much as twenty
feet high and one or two feet in diameter.
| Then it sends up one splendid great bunch
of blossoms, and then-dies.
| 1t is called the sage palm, and the stuff
from which we make the pudding is in
! side the trunk. The natives almost live
on it, and getting it out is curious ope-
| ration. They select tree Just before it
! blossoms and cut it down. The leaves are
cut off, and slice taken out of the bark
| the whole length of the trunk. The trunk,
| like the leaf-ribs, is merely shell packed
with firm pith, so when the upper part
is cut off, you see, it makes very conve-
nient trough in which to work
The native then takes club with a
| sharp stone fastened in the end, and pro-
ceeds to cut and break up this pith into a
coarse sort Of powder When he has fin
! ished his work, the shell of the tree is not
more than half an inch thick and filled
with sage.
He then takes a blanket, made of the
sheathing bases Of the leaves, and carries
| the sage tc washing machine, also made
! of the universal tree-the trOughs Of the
sheathing bases of the large leaves, and
the stralner or the threads from the fibrOus
covering of the cocoanut. The pith is
put IN at the upper end, water poured on
and then kneaded and pressed till the sage
| is dissolved and run through the strainer,
and the refuse thrown away. From the
stralner it runs into deeper trough,
where the sage sinks to the bottom and
the water runs off. When the trough is
full, the sage is taken out, made into
thlrty-pound rolls, wrapped in sage palm
| leaves, and called raw sage.
Now comes the woman's part of the
work. She don't make it into buildings
with milk and eggs, as we do. She gen
orally makes it all up at once into bread.
| She don't bother herself to make bread
every day or two, by no means; the Ma
| lay matron makes her bread for year at
one time. This is how she does it. She
has curious oven, a sort Of box made
of clay, with several divisions in it. She
breaks up roll of sage, dries it in the
sun, and makes it into powder. She then
heats the oven, by putting it on the Goals,
and, when hot enough, she fills 1t up with
the powdered sage. She covers the droll
oven with piece Of sage bark, and in a
| few minutes she turns it over and drops
out six thin, square cakes, soft and light,
and very nice while hot, travellers say.
| But she does not make them to be eaten