THE NARBADA VALLEY^. 81 



apprehensions of danger in some degree during the 

 Mhowa season ; and the most favourable chances of 

 shooting them are then obtained. The trees have to 

 be watched night and day if the crop is to be saved ; 

 and the wilder races, who fear neither wild beast nor 

 evil spirit, are generally engaged to do this for a 

 wage of one-half the j)roduce. The yield of flowers 

 from a sinole tree is about 130 lbs., worth five shillinsrs 

 in the market ; and the nuts, which form in bunches 

 after the dropping of the flowers, yield a thick oil, 

 much resembling tallow in appearance and properties. 

 It is used for burning, for the manufacture of soap, 

 and in adulterating the clarified butter so largely con- 

 sumed by all natives. A demand for it has lately 

 sprung up in the Bombay market ; and a good deal 

 has been exported since the opening of the railway. 

 The supply must be immense ; and probably this new 

 demand wdll be the means of greatly increasing the 

 value of the trees. 



I encamped at the end of this march at a j)hace 

 called Mohpani, the scene of the works of the "Ner- 

 budda Coal and Iron Company." Most of the miners 

 employed at that time were Gonds, whose courage 

 in diving into the bowels of the earth was found to 

 be superior to that of other races. The universal 

 pantheism of the Gond stands him in good stead on 

 such occasions. From his cradle he has looked on 

 every rock, stream, and cavern as tenanted by its 

 peculiar spirit, whom it is only needful to propitiate 

 in a simple fashion to make all safe. So he just 

 touches with vermilion the rock he is about to blow 

 into a thousand fragments with a keg of powder, 

 lays before it a handful of rice and a nutshell full 



