Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 05.djvu/135

* COCOANUT. 105 COCO KIVER. sea-water. It is also employed as an article of food, so long as it remains free from rancidity — to which, however, it is very liable. It is obtained by pressure of the bruised kernel, or by boiling over a slow fire, and skimming off the oil as it lloats on the surface. A quart, it is said, may be obtained from seven or eiglit cocoa- nuts. It is liquid at the ordinary temperature of tropical countries, but in colder climates be- comes a wliite, solid, butler-like oil. It becomes liquid about 7-1° F. It can be separated by com- pression into a liquid portion called 'olein,' and a more solid part termed 'stearin,' or 'coeosin,' which is of complex constitution. The cake re- sulting from the pressure of the endosperm for its oil is an important cattle-food. Cocoanut oil is not a good lamp-oil, as it chars on the wick and burns with a smoky flame. The root of the cocoaiuit palm possesses nar- cotic properties, and is sometimes chewed in- stead of the areca-nut. When the stem is young, its central part is sweet and edible; but when old, tills is a mass of hard fibre. The terminal hud (palm-cabbage) is esteemed a delicacy, and trees are often cut down for the sake of it. The saccharine sap of the' flower-spathes before they open is a source of toddy and palm wine, and by distillation the liquor arrack. In the East In- dies the juice is often boiled down to yield BUgar (jaggery). The dried leaves of the cocoanut palm are much used for thatch, and for many other pur- poses, as the making of mats, screens, baskets, etc., by plaiting the leaflets. The midribs of the leaves supply the natives of tropical coasts with oars. The wood of the lower part of the stem is very hard, takes a beautiful polish, and is employed for a great variety of purposes, under the name of porcupine-wood. The fibrous cen- tre of old stems is made into cordage. By far the most important fibrous product of the cocoa- nut-tree is coir (q.v. ), the fibre of the husk of the somewhat immature nut. If the nuts are allowed to ripen, the coir is coarser and more brittle. The husk of the ripe nut is used for fuel, and also, W'hen cut across, for polishing furniture, scrubbing floors, etc. The shell of the cocoanut is made into cups, goblets, ladles, etc., and is often finely polished and elaborately orna- mented by carving. Cocos butyracea. one of the South American species of tliis genus, is a very large tree, and its nut abounds in an oil and butter of similar quality to that obtained from the cocoanut. The double cocoanut of the Seychelles Islands is the fruit of a palm of a diff'erent genus (Lodoicea sechellarvm). Cocos yoddcllianum is the spe- cies most commonly cultivated in greenhouses and in the open as an ornamental. For illustra- tion, see Palms. COCOANUT or ROBBER CRAB. A large terrestrial maorurous crab {Bir(]iis liifro). of the East Indies, which feeds on ooeoanuts. Although allied to the hermit, it has the abdomen symmet- rical and covered above, with a series of horny plates, so that it requires no borrowed shell or other artificial protection. It is found in the islands of the Indian and South Pacific oceans, and may reach a size larger than that of any other land crab, enabling it to handle the largest nuts; and Forbes says that "one of its pincer- claws is developed into an organ of extraordinary power, capable, when the creature is enraged, of breaking a man's arm." lis flesh is edible. It (tigs and inhabits burrows and long tunnels, lined with fibres strip])ed from cocoanuts. In these it lurks during the day, going abroad, as a rule, only at night. It feeds mainly upon fallen cocoanuts, not gathering them from the trees, as has been asserted, allliough it often climbs into the palms. "To get at the contents of the nut, the cral) first tears away the ril)re overlying the three 'eyes,' and then haimiiers away with its claws at the latter until a hole is made, when it extracts the kernel by means of its smaller pincers." This crab has its gills so modified as to function as lungs. It occasionally visits the water, and periodically resorts to the sea to spawn, where the young pass through their developmental stages in the water like other crabs. Several species are known. Consult: Darwin, A Natu- ralist's Vuiiane (London, 18G0) ; Forbes, A Natu- ralist's Wanderings in the Eastern Archipelago (N"ew York, 1885). See Plate of Crabs. COCOA-PLUM. An edible drupaceous fruit growing on a slirub (Chrysobalanus Icaco) of the order IJosaceie, in Florida and the West Indies. It is yellow, purple, or black, and is much like a large plum in appearance. The skin is thin, and the sweet white pulp adheres firmly to the stone. COCOA-ROOT. See Cocco. COCOA-TREE CLUB, The. A London club, developed aliout the middle of the eighteenth century from the Tory Cocoa-Tree Chocolate House, which flourished during the reign of Queen Anne. It was a gathering place of .Jacob- ites, and was frequented by many leading men of the day. COCOMA, k6-k(yma. An important tribe of Tupian stock, anciently living at the junction of the Huallaga and ilaraiion (Amazon), but now lower down at Nauta, at the entrance of the Ucayali, northeastern Peru. Before the .Jesuits established missions among them, about 1680, they had the custom of eating their dead relatives and grinding their bones to powder to drink in a native liquor, assigning as a rea- son that "it was better to be inside a friend than to be swallowed up in the cold earth." They are described as shrewd, provident, and industrious, good boatmen, and braver fighters than most of the civilized Indians. COCONUT. See Cocoanut. COCOON' (from Fr. cocon, dim. of eoque, shell, from Lat. concha, shell). The pupa-case of an insect. See Insect ; B;;tterflies and Moths ; and Ant. COCO'PA. An agricultural tribe, supposed to be of Yuman stock, formerly holding the country about the mouth of the Colorado Eiver and the head of the Gulf of California, in Mex- ico, and sometimes ranging northward into Ari- zona. They still number about 500. but are rapidly wasting away from contact with Ameri- can civilization. Their present habitat is on the Colorado River from the Gila to its mouth. CO'CO RIVER, Wanks, or Segovia. A river in Central America, forming a portion of the boundary line between Honduras and Nicar.agua (Map; Central .America, M 5). It runs in a generally northeasterly direction, and enters the sea at Cape Gracias S Dios. Its total length is about 300 miles, and it is navigable through a portion of the course.