The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-03-14
lie mu IT,


Observation-Disclosures
| When the South Sea Islander longs
for candy he digs up some ii roots,
pronounced '.tsi, a species of Cordy-
line, and bakes them in native oven
for fortyeight hours The rough and
blackened exterior is then stripped off,
and the ii root appears as brownish
pulp streaked with woody ibers, and
full of saccharine matter, with a flavor
like molasses. This sweetmeat is chew
ed by the young kanakas with great
relish, and affords them as much graf
ifieation as the choicest candy does to
white children.
A I'll bakeo is an event of social
Importance in an island community.
One oven is usually made, and as a
hundred families may each bring their
| quota to be baked in the common oven,
the .umu'' necessary to accommodate
| two or three hundred baskets of the
roots is consequently an immense one
[ witnessed ii bake IN the Cook
Islands on one occasion, and the spec.
| tacle was unique and interesting. al
most the whole population of the vii.
lage, comprising about eight hundred
people, went into the woods before
daylight to collect the roots and pre-.
pare the oven. They sent word to me
| in the evening that the oyen was be-
ling charged, SO / went up to see what
was doing.
| 1t was weird scene. A circular pit
| twenty feet in diameter and three feet
deep had been dug in an open space
in the forest, and filed with brush
wood and logs, over this was piled a
| great heap of stones. The fire had been
burning for hours, and the whole pit
was filed with glowing mass of red
| hot stones and burning Goals.
| The heat was terrific. A crowd OF
savages eneircled the burning fiery
furnace, every man entirely naked ex-
cept for a mat of green leaves round
| his Ioins, and garlands of gorgeous
colored wild flowers around his head
and shoulders.
| Their brown skins shone with cocoa
| nut oil and perspiration. In the glare
of the flames and envirored by the
dense tropical vegetation, the scene re
| minded me of an incident from Dante IS
| Inferno. Great poles over thirty feet
! in length, with hook at the end were
| brought up and four or five men seized
each pole and smoothed down the mass
of hot stones, raking aside the half
burned pieces of frewood. As they
| worked they sang an ancient chant de-
scriptive of the exploits of an ancestor
| named "Laufoli' who sailed to the
| island of Beqa in the FIJI group, and
| upon his return home amazed his fell
low tribesmen by leaping into an umu
| ii, and walking across it on the red
hot stones, without being seorehed, OF
harmed thereby.
| He had learned the art of frewalking
| from the men of Beqa, who are famous
throughout the Pacific for their super.
i natural power of passing over fiery
| furnaces with bare feet, unscathed by
| the fervent heat.
Laufoli repeated his exploit at sue
| ceeding ii bakes, until ON one unlucky
! day stone exploded in the pit, and a
| fragment struck him on the head and
killed him instantly. He does not ap'
pear to have impaired his secret to his
countrymen, for frewalking is now on.
ly tradition in his island.
When the hot stones in the pit were
raked level, baskets full of ii roots,
many of them as thick as mans leg,
and three feet long, were piled in the
pit until the whole surface was covered
several tiers deep.
Green boughs were then laid on the
top, and hundreds of baskets full of
soil were brought and emptied on the
pile until it was completely covered,
and resembled a small hill.
/ did not see the oven unearthed on
the third day, but tasted some of the
baked ii and found it TO be very sweet,
and by no means unpalatable in flavor.
7 have noticed similar plant grow
ing in great quantities on the hiflsides
in these islands, and am informed that
a spirit called eokolehaoo is illieitly
distilled from it.
As this plant is so plentiful here,
and contains SO much saccharine mat.
ter it might pay to utilize it on legiti-
mate lines for the manufacture of de-
natured alcohol What would be better
still, as the spirit derived from the root
is said to have a peculiarly agreeable
flavor, liqueur might be evolved
from it which would eclipse the famous
Benedietine and Chartreuse liqueurs
of France
Here is an idea for a new and profit.
arle industry in these islands