The manufacture is common to all Polynesia, and the ordinary name for it in the Pacific is Tapa.

The Tahitians, however, called it Ahu.) Dr.Solander thinks it is the same plant the bark of which the Chinese make paper of.
They let this plant grow till it is about 6 or 8 feet high, the Stem is then about as thick as one's Thum or thicker; after this they cut it down and lay it a Certain time in water.

This makes the Bark strip off easy, the outside of which is scraped off with a rough Shell.

After this is done it looks like long strips of ragged linnen; these they lay together, by means of a fine paist made of some sort of a root, to the Breadth of a yard more or less, and in length 6, 8 or 10 Yards or more according to the use it is for.

After it is thus put together it is beat out to its proper breadth and fineness, upon a long square piece of wood, with wooden beaters, the Cloth being keept wet all the time.