Note 44 — Chapter II

At present the plantain is almost as bad as the potato, formerly of so many uses; it supplies the people with food and drink, wine and water, cloth, thatch, rope, fuel, fodder, and perfume; and it can supply them with writing materials. I republish from the ‘Cavalla Messenger,’ the Missionary paper printed at Cape Palmas, an excellent description of plantain-planting:—

‘Mr. Editor,—I take the liberty, in the following communication, to call the attention of your readers to the growth of the plantain for its fibre.

‘In the first place I would remark that it is easily cultivated. In preparing the ground for a crop in this country, we meet with one grand difficulty—the want of the plough and team. Yet this is less felt than in many parts of the world. The constant fall of rain in the growing seasons softens the ground, and conveys to the roots of plants the soluble parts of the decaying vegetable and mineral matter composing the soil as perfectly and thoroughly as if ploughed and otherwise cultivated by a team. But in the growth of the plantain we are less dependent on plough and oxen for success than in the management of most other crops. This is a fact very strongly recommending it to the attention of the farmer.

‘To put out a field of plantains the ground should be prepared much as it is for cassada-roots. The ground then should be laid out in rows about twelve or eighteen feet apart each way.

‘At the point crossed by these rows the soil should be thoroughly dug up, and a healthy root set in the centre. The plant usually does best when laid down so as to sprout from the side. This will give from three to four hundred plants to the acre.

‘For the first year or two, cassada, cotton, pepper, ginger, corn, arrowroot, sugar-cane, or some other crop, should be grown with it.

‘The third year will give seven suckers to each plant, which will make 2400 to 2800 stalks, with as many bunches of delicious, healthy, nutritious fruit. This gathered when fully ripe may be easily preserved for food or export. In England it takes the place of dried apple, and commands a price that will richly pay the farmer all the labour of cultivation and curing for market.

‘The process of drying is simple. The ripe fruit is laid in the hot sun on mats elevated from the ground. After it becomes wilted it is taken from the skin and replaced upon the mats till dry, when it is coated with sugar, like figs. This process might be shortened by kiln-drying.

‘The fruit when full grown, before the process of ripening commences, is very rich in starch, and when dried and ground makes an excellent meal. To make plantain-meal the plantain must be gathered when full grown. The skins must be removed with a bamboo-knife, so as not to discolour the fruit. Then cut in thin slices and dry in the sun, or on a kiln, which is better. When brittle grind into meal.

‘The fact that the fruit for home consumption or the foreign market will richly pay for cultivation is an item of importance. For this purpose is the plantain chiefly raised. The stalk is by many regarded valueless. Yet it is by the addition of a little labour worth 3d. a stalk.

‘An acre of well-matured thrifty plants will produce 6000 lbs. of fibre, at a cost in labour of 3l. per ton; and with an additional cost of 7l. per ton may be placed in an English market.

‘Plantain-fibre, after patient, varied, and repeated experiment, has been proved to be equal to hemp for all the purposes of cordage, and now commands the same price as good hemp, say from 30l. to 35l. per ton, giving a clear profit to the grower of more than 20l. the ton.

‘To convert the stalk into fibre, it is cut into lengths of three feet long and quartered. This should be done as quick as may be, so as not to black the fibre with the iron instrument used in cutting.

‘Furnished with a mill like a horizontal sugar-mill, having wood rollers four feet long and one foot in diameter, turned by horse-power, the quartered stalks are passed between the rollers longitudinally so as not to stain the fibre. Then the crushed stalks are washed thoroughly (which process separates the fibre from the pulpy matter of the stalks), and the fibre is hung on poles under a shade to dry. The sun discolours it.

‘When dry, it is combed or hackled, as flax or hemp, when it is fit for the market.

‘The tow or waste from the combing is beaten and prepared as half-stuff for paper at a cost of about 8l. per ton, and is worth as much as linen rags for paper, say from 16l. to 20l. per ton.’