st elegant class in vegetation. For
upward of a hundred and twenty miles along the western and southern
coasts of Ceylon, one continuous line of cocoa-nut groves wave their
green leaves to the sea-breeze, without a single break, except where
some broad clear river cleaves the line of verdure as it meets the sea.

Ceylon is rich in palms, including the following varieties: The
Cocoa-nut. The Palmyra. The Kittool. The Areca The Date. The Sago. The
Talipot.

The wonderful productions of this tribe can only be appreciated by
those who thoroughly understand the habits and necessities of the
natives; and, upon examination, it will be seen that Nature has opened
wide her bountiful hand, and in the midst of a barren soil she has
still remembered and supplied the wants of the inhabitants.

As the stream issued from the rock in the wilderness, to the cocoa-nut
tree yields a pure draught from a dry and barren land; a cup of water
to the temperate and thirsty traveler; a cup of cream from the pressed
kernel; a cup of refreshing and sparkling toddy to the early riser; a
cup of arrack to the hardened spirit-drinker, and a cup of oil, by the
light of which I now extol its merits-five separate and distinct
liquids from the same tree!

A green or unripe cocoa-nut contains about a pint of a sweetish water.
In the hottest weather this is deliciously cool, in comparison to the
heat of the atmosphere.

The ripe nut, when scraped into a pulp by a little serrated,
semi-circular iron instrument, is squeezed in a cloth by the hand, and
about a quarter of a pint of delicious thick cream, highly flavored by
cocoa-nut, is then expressed. This forms the chief ingredient in a
Cingalese curry, from which it entirely derives its richness and fine
flavor.

The toddy is the sap which would nourish and fructify the blossom and
young nuts, were it allowed to accomplish its duties. The toddy-drawer
binds into one rod the numerous shoots, which are garnished with embryo
nuts, and he then cuts off the ends, leaving an abrupt and brush-like
termination. Beneath this he secures an earthen chatty, which will
hold about a gallon. This remains undisturbed for twenty-four hours,
from sunrise to sunrise on the following morning; the toddy-drawer then
reascends the tree, and lowers he chatty by a line to an assistant
below, who empties the contents into a larger vessel, and the chatty is
replaced under the productive branch, which continues to yield for