to, and meeting at, the fire.  To produce a stream of air bunches of feathers or other soft substance, being fastened to long handles, are worked up and down in the upright tubes, like the piston of a pump.  These, when pushed downwards, force the air through the small horizontal tubes, and, by raising and sinking each alternately, a continual current or blast is kept up; for which purpose a boy is usually placed on a high seat or stand.  I cannot retrain from remarking that the description of the bellows used in Madagascar, as given by Sonnerat, Volume 2 page 60, so entirely corresponds with this that the one might almost pass for a copy of the other.

CARPENTER’S WORK.

The progress they have made in carpenter’s work has been already pointed out, where there buildings were described.

TOOLS.

They are ignorant of the use of the saw, excepting where we have introduced it among them.  Trees are felled by chopping at the stems, and in procuring boards they are confined to those the direction of whose grain or other qualities admit of their being easily split asunder.  In this respect the species called maranti and marakuli have the preference.  The tree, being stripped of its branches and its bark, is cut to the length required, and by the help of wedges split into boards.  These being of irregular thickness are usually dubbed upon the spot.  The tool used for this purpose is the rembe, a kind of adze.  Most of their smaller work, and particularly on the bamboo, is performed with the papatil, which resembles in shape as much as in name the patupatu of the New Zealanders, but has the vast superiority of being made of iron.  The blade, which is fastened to the handle with a nice and curious kind of rattan-work, is so contrived as to turn in it, and by that means can be employed either as an adze or small hatchet.  Their houses are generally built with the assistance of this simple instrument alone.  The billiong is no other than a large papatil, with a handle of two or three feet in length, turning, like that, in its socket.

CEMENTS.

The chief cement they employ for small work is the curd of buffalo-milk, called prakat.  It is to be observed that butter is made (for the use of Europeans only; the words used by the Malays, for butter and cheese, monteiga and queijo, being pure Portuguese) not as with us, by churning, but by letting the milk stand till the butter forms of itself on the top.  It is then taken off with a spoon, stirred about with the same in a flat vessel, and well washed in two or three waters.  The thick sour milk left at the bottom, when the butter or cream is removed, is the curd here meant.  This must be well squeezed, formed into cakes, and left to dry, when it will grow nearly as hard as flint.  For use you must scrape some of it off, mix it with quick lime, and moisten it with milk.  I think there is no stronger cement in the world, and it is found to hold, particularly in a hot and damp climate, much better than glue; proving also effectual in mending chinaware.  The viscous juice of the saga-pea (abrus) is likewise used in the country as a cement.