long, and in some places a foot and a half wide. It is an unbroken leaf,
with a large stem running through the middle of it. It is one of the
handsomest of leaves. Pieces enough can be torn from a single leaf, to
take the place of a dozen plates. When quite young, it is an excellent
application to surfaces which have been blistered.

When this people eat, they do not use tables and chairs. They sit down
on mats, and double their legs under them, after the manner of our
friends the tailors in America, when they sew. This is the way in which
the natives as a general thing, sit in our churches. It is not common to
have benches or pews for them. Carpenters and other tradesmen also sit
down either on a board, or on the ground, or on their legs, when they
work. It would divert you much to see their manoeuvring. If a carpenter,
for instance, wants to make a little peg, he will take a small piece of
board, and place it in an erect position between his feet, the soles of
which are turned inward so as to press upon the board. He then takes
his chisel in one hand, and his mallet in the other, and cuts off a
small piece. Afterwards he holds the piece in one hand, and while he
shapes it with his chisel with the other, he steadies it by pressing it
against his great toe.

[Illustration]

The blacksmiths, with the exception of those who use the sledge-hammer,
sit as do the carpenters while they hammer the iron. I wish you could
see them at work with their simple apparatus. They have small anvils,
which they place in a hole made in a log of wood which is buried in the
ground. They do not use such bellows as you see in America.

Theirs consist of two leather bags, about a foot wide and a foot and a