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- 6840
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:14.842Z
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- 6797
- text
- specifically heavier than water; it is easily worked, and extremely
strong and durable. But its chief merit lies in resisting the action of
the salt water, and the attacks of insects; which resistance is caused
by its containing a resinous oil called _“poonja.”_
To my surprise, he informed me that the Irrawaddy was wholly built by
the native shipwrights of India, who, he modestly asserted, surpassed
the European artisans.
The rigging, also, was of native manufacture. As the _kayar,_ of which
it is composed, is now getting into use both in England and America, as
well for ropes and rigging as for mats and rugs, my Lascar friend’s
account of it, joined to my own observations, may not be uninteresting.
In India, it is prepared very much in the same way as in Polynesia. The
cocoa-nut is gathered while the husk is still green, and but partially
ripe; and this husk is removed by striking the nut forcibly, with both
hands, upon a sharp-pointed stake, planted uprightly in the ground. In
this way a boy will strip nearly fifteen hundred in a day. But the
_kayar_ is not made from the husk, as might be supposed, but from the
rind of the nut; which, after being long soaked in water, is beaten
with mallets, and rubbed together into fibers. After this being dried
in the sun, you may spin it, just like hemp, or any similar substance.
The fiber thus produced makes very strong and durable ropes, extremely
well adapted, from their lightness and durability, for the running
rigging of a ship; while the same causes, united with its great
strength and buoyancy, render it very suitable for large cables and
hawsers.
But the elasticity of the _kayar_ ill fits it for the shrouds and
standing-rigging of a ship, which require to be comparatively firm.
Hence, as the Irrawaddy’s shrouds were all of this substance, the
Lascar told me, they were continually setting up or slacking off her
standing-rigging, according as the weather was cold or warm. And the
loss of a foretopmast, between the tropics, in a squall, he attributed
to this circumstance.
After a stay of about two weeks, the Irrawaddy had her heavy Indian
spars replaced with Canadian pine, and her _kayar_ shrouds with hempen
ones. She then mustered her pagans, and hoisted sail for London.
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