it is seldom seen otherwise than in a liquid state,
as it fuses a little above 70 deg. Fahr.

It is only in the last few years that Coprah has acquired importance as
an article of export. There are large cocoanut plantations on all the
principal islands, whence supplies are furnished to meet the foreign
demand, which is likely to increase considerably.

For figures of _Coprah_ Shipments, _vide_ Chap. xxxi., "Trade
Statistics."

Uses are also found for the hard Shell of the nut (Tagalog, _Baoo_). In
native dwellings these shells serve the poor for cups (_tabo _) and a
variety of other useful domestic utensils, whilst by all classes they
are converted into ladles with wooden handles. Also, when carbonized,
the shell gives a black, used for dyeing straw hats.

Very little use is made of the Coir (Tagalog, _Bunot_), or outer
fibrous skin, which in other countries serves for the manufacture
of cocoanut matting, coarse brushes, hawsers, etc. It is said that
coir rots in fresh water, whereas salt water strengthens it. It
would therefore be unsuitable for running rigging, but for ships'
cables it cannot be surpassed in its qualities of lightness and
elasticity. As it floats on water, it ought to be of great value
on ships, whilst of late years its employment in the manufacture of
light ocean telegraph cables has been seriously considered, showing,
as it does, an advantage over other materials by taking a convex curve
to the water surface--an important condition in cable-laying. [145]
The Spaniards call this product _Banote_. In this Colony it often
serves for cleaning floors and ships' decks, when the nut is cut into
two equal parts across the grain of the coir covering, and with it
a very high polish can be put on to hardwoods.

The stem of the Cocoanut Palm is attacked by a very large beetle
with a single horn at the top of its head. It bores through the bark
and slightly injures the tree, but I never heard that any had died
in consequence. In some countries this insect is described as the
rhinoceros beetle, and is said to belong to the _Dynastidae_ species.

In the Philippines, the poorest soil seems to give nourishment to the
cocoanut-palm; indeed, it thrives best on, or near, the sea-shore,
as close to the sea as where the beach is fringed by the surf at high
tide. The common cocoanut-palm attains a height of about sixty feet,
but there is also a dwarf palm with the stem sometimes no taller
than four feet at full gr