Page:Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks.djvu/205

1769 where of equal thickness, so that if any part of a piece of bark had been scraped too thin, another thin piece was laid over it, in order to render it of the same thickness as the rest. When laid out in this manner, a piece of cloth is eleven or twelve yards long, and not more than a foot broad, for as the longitudinal fibres are all laid lengthwise, they do not expect it to stretch in that direction, though they well know how considerably it will in the other.

In this state they suffer it to remain till morning, by which time a large proportion of the water with which it was thoroughly soaked has either drained off or evaporated, and the fibres begin to adhere together, so that the whole may be lifted from the ground without dropping in pieces. It is then taken away by the women servants, who beat it in the following manner. They lay it upon a long piece of wood, one side of which is very even and flat, this side being put under the cloth: as many women then as they can muster, or as can work at the board together, begin to beat it. Each is furnished with a baton made of the hard wood, etoa (Casuarina equisetifolia): it is about a foot long and square with a handle; on each of the four faces of the square are many small furrows, whose width differs on each face, and which cover the whole face. They begin with the coarsest side, keeping time with their strokes in the same manner as smiths, and continue until the cloth, which extends rapidly under these strokes, shows by the too great thinness of the groves which are made in it that a finer side of the beater is requisite. In this manner they proceed to the finest side, with which they finish; unless the cloth is to be of that very fine sort hoboo, which is almost as thin as muslin. In making this last they double the piece several times, and beat it out again and afterwards bleach it in the sun and air, which in these climates produce whiteness in a very