It is women's work to collect the beans, make the shell-planes, and do
the shredding. In the first place the beans are cooked, the oven
consisting of hot stones covered with leaves. In three or four hours
they are taken out and planed, a dilly-bag (basket made of narrow
strips of lawyer cane or grass) full of the shavings is immersed in
running water for two or three days, the food being then ready for
consumption without further preparation. In appearance it resembles
coarse tapioca, and it has no particular flavour. To give it zest,
some have a shell containing sea-water beside them when they dine,
into which each portion of the mess is dipped. As saponin is very
soluble in water, by soaking the shredded beans for a few days the
blacks resort to an absolutely perfect method of converting a
poisonous substance into a valuable and sustaining, if tasteless,
food. No doubt, made up into a pudding with eggs, milk, sugar and
flavouring, shredded beans would pass without comment as a substitute
for tapioca.
MESSAGE-STICKS
There came to our beach one afternoon some poor exiles from Princess
Charlotte Bay--300 miles to the north. Exiled they felt themselves to
be, and were longing to return to their own country although their
engagement for a six months' cruise in quest of the passive beche-de-mer
had but just begun.
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