350 PLANTS USED BY INDIANS OF MENDOCINO COUNTY, CAL. 
is more or less irritant and acrid, an effeet which the early settlers 
compared with pepper and therefore called the tree pepperwood, or, 
on account of the general use of the nuts for food by the Indians, 
peppernut tree, 
These nuts (pol’-eum) are thin-shelled and nearly spherical, being 
about one-half inch in diameter. They contain a large kernel and are 
surrounded by a fleshy covering which makes the fruit look very much 
like an olive. Both the flesh of the ripe fruit and the kernel are used 
for food, but the upper two-thirds of the former is rejected on account 
of the larger amount of acrid oil which it contains. The taste is not 
at all disagreeable, as might be suspected. The kernel is altogether 
too acrid to eat until the nut has been thoroughly parched, and even 
then it has a slight pungency, which is, however, rather agreeable. 
It was difficult to find out to what extent and for what purpose the 
nuts are used for food, but a single family often uses 3 or + bushels 
in one year, and many Indians have a considerable supply on hand 
throughout the whole of the year. Not more than a dozen or two are 
consumed at a single meal, and therefore it seems probable that they 
are used either as a relish, condiment, or stimulant. Several Indians 
informed me that they often took a quantity of the nuts with them 
when they were forced to take long tramps through the woods or to 
go a long time without food. The Indians compare them with coffee, 
and indeed the parched fruit tastes considerably like that substance. 
They are never used, however, to make a drink of, although the bark 
of the root is so used, according to an intelligent half-breed Concow. 
On the other hand, the kernel contains some starch and from 40 to 60 
per cent of a peculiar fatty oil which may have some food value. The 
nuts are roasted and eaten, often with clover, or are roasted, shelled, 
and pounded up into a small mass, which on account of the large con- 
tent of oil is easily molded. When so prepared it is called ** bread” 
(pol’-cum hét'-mil) by the Yuki. 
A chemical investigation of the fixed oil contained in the nut was 
made by Prof. J. M. Stillman and Prof. Edmond O'Neil! at the Uni- 
versity of California, but no dietary or pharmacological work was 
done upon it. 
The medicinal use of the leaves is extremely varied. Their value 
depends almost entirely upon the pungent volatile oil which the y 
contain, and they are mostly applied externally in the form of a decoe- 
tion, either for their cooling, irritant, or insecticidal and germicidal 
effect. To cure headache, a portion of a leaf is either placed in the 
nostril or several are bound upon the forehead or under the hat, or 
the head is washed with a strong decoction of the leaves. This is done 
also to kill vermin on the hea ad. As a counterirritant for chronic 
‘Am. Chem. Journ., vol. 4, pp. 206 to 211. 1882-83. 
