Chapter Fifteen

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

KINDNESS OF MARHEYO AND THE REST OF THE ISLANDERS--A FULL
DESCRIPTION OF THE BREAD- FRUIT TREE--DIFFERENT MODES OF
PREPARING THE FRUIT

ALL the inhabitants of the valley treated me with great kindness;
but as to the household of Marheyo, with whom I was now
permanently domiciled, nothing could surpass their efforts to
minister to my comfort. To the gratification of my palate they
paid the most unwearied attention. They continually invited me
to partake of food, and when after eating heartily I declined the
viands they continued to offer me, they seemed to think that my
appetite stood in need of some piquant stimulant to excite its
activity.

In pursuance of this idea, old Marheyo himself would hie him away
to the sea-shore by the break of day, for the purpose of
collecting various species of rare sea-weed; some of which among
these people are considered a great luxury. After a whole day
spent in this employment, he would return about nightfall with
several cocoanut shells filled with different descriptions of
kelp. In preparing these for use he manifested all the
ostentation of a professed cook, although the chief mystery of
the affair appeared to consist in pouring water in judicious
quantities upon the slimy contents of his cocoanut shells.

The first time he submitted one of these saline salads to my
critical attention I naturally thought that anything collected at
such pains must possess peculiar merits; but one mouthful was a
complete dose; and great was the consternation of the old warrior
at the rapidity with which I ejected his Epicurean treat.

How true it is, that the rarity of any particular article
enhances its value amazingly. In some part of the valley--I know
not where, but probably in the neighbourhood of the sea--the
girls were sometimes in the habit of procuring small quantities
of salt, a thimble-full or so being the result of the united
labours of a party of five or six employed for the greater part
of the day. This precious commodity they brought to the house,
enveloped in multitudinous folds of leaves; and as a special mark
of the esteem in which they held me, would spread an immense leaf
on the ground, and dropping one by one a few minute particles of
the salt upon it, invite me to taste them.

From the extravagant value placed upon the article, I verily
believe, that with a bushel of common Liverpool salt all the real
estate in Typee might have been purchased. With a small pinch of
it in one hand, and a quarter section of a bread-fruit in the
other, the greatest chief in the valley would have laughed at all
luxuries of a Parisian table.

The celebrity of the bread-fruit tree, and the conspicuous place
it