Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 67.djvu/234

228 fiber. A single freshly cut leaf is placed upon a smooth board and is then scraped with an old plate or piece of earthenware. This scraping removes the pulpy material and lays bare a layer of fiber which is deftly lifted with the finger or a small spatula. After the fiber has been thus extracted it is washed in running water and dried in the sun. Frequently the washing and drying are repeated several times before the required degree of softness and fineness is obtained. It is estimated that twenty-one thousand leaves are required to produce fifty pounds of fiber. When it is considered that each separate leaf 1 must be slowly and laboriously scraped, the small production and high price of piña fabrics are not surprising. Before piña can become a product of any considerable commercial importance, a machine must be perfected for the extraction of the fiber.

The white cotton tree with its tall straight trunk, its almost horizontal branches, and large odd-looking seed pods is well known to any one who has traveled through the Philippine provinces. This tree is found in nearly all parts of the tropical world. In Java there are extensive kapok plantations, but in other countries we usually find the cotton tree growing along the roadsides, scattered through the forests; or, as in India, planted about the old Buddhist temples. There are no kapok plantations in the Philippines, but the cotton tree grows in nearly all of the provinces and the fiber is very generally used for local purposes.

Kapok is the floss obtained from the seeds of the cotton tree and, in a structural classification, is one of the 'surface fibers.' The fiber is too short a staple, and also too brittle and elastic, to be spun, but these very properties make it the most valuable of all the vegetable fibers as a stuffing and filling material. Its harshness and elasticity prevent its becoming matted when used for cushions, pillows and mattresses. For bandages and surgical dressings it is cooler and more elastic than cotton.

Not only does the cotton tree produce a valuable fiber, but it has, also, a number of other economic uses. The tree itself, with its horizontal branches, is used for living telegraph poles and as a shade tree on coffee plantations. The wood, which is light and soft, is utilized for tanning leather and for making toys. The sap and tender leaves have a medicinal value. The bark yields a reddish fiber from which cordage and paper are made. The roots, when powdered and mixed with the sap, is a cure for dysentery. The fruit has some value as a food product. The seed yields an excellent oil and the seed cake is used both for cattle-feeding and as a fertilizer.

In Java the production of kapok is rapidly becoming a leading industry, and this fiber is getting to be more generally known and more