The fern tree is found also of a great height for its species, measuring from seventy to eighty feet, and affords excellent food for the sheep and other small cattle.

A plant producing pepper, and supposed to be the true oriental pepper, has been discovered lately in the island, growing in great plenty; and specimens have been sent to England, in order to ascertain this important point.
[* The flax plant is thus described in Captain Cook's first voyage, vol.
iii.p.39.as found at New Zealand.

"There is, however, a plant that serves the inhabitants instead of hemp and flax, which excels all that are put to the same purposes in other countries.

Of this plant there are two sorts; the leaves of both resemble those of flags, but the flowers are smaller and their clusters more numerous; in one kind they are yellow, and in the other a deep red.

Of the leaves of these plants, with very little preparation, they make all their common apparel; and of these they also make their strings, lines, and cordage for every purpose, which are so much stronger than any thing we can make with hemp, that they will not bear a comparison.