Page:Twenty years before the mast - Charles Erskine, 1896.djvu/180

 By means of pointed sticks a large trench was dug in the earth. This trench was then lined with stones, and had a fire built in it. After the stones had become sufficiently heated, the bottom was covered with many layers of banana and plantain leaves. Three human bodies were then brought from the mabure house and laid in the  trench upon the thick bed of leaves, together with some  hogs, and a large quantity of yams and taro. The whole was then covered with large quantities of leaves, and a  fire built on top. It is a great cause for gratitude that the light of Christianity has penetrated to these dark regions,  and that such horribly barbarous customs have ceased  to exist.

A favorite pudding among these natives was called okalolos, of which they made several kinds. The following is the recipe: Half a calabash was first lined with a few  plantain leaves. A layer of the golden banana cut in slices was placed on the bottom, and on this was laid  another layer of a different flavor, and so on. The meat of the cocoanut, which is, when ripe and freshly gathered,  as soft as jelly, was placed between the alternate layers,  which were continued until the dish was filled. The milk of the cocoanuts was then poured over the whole, and  then the ends of the plantain leaves, with which the dish  was lined and which had projected above the top of the  dish, were gathered up and tied around with a string  taken from the bark of a tree, after which the jar was  placed in the trench, under the leaves, to steam. It takes about four hours to cook a dinner in this manner,  but these Fiji okalolos were steamed in about thirty  minutes, and I can testify that they far excelled all the