BUTTER OF ECONOMIC PLANTS. 71 



« 



parts of India. By pressure the seeds yield a semi-solid oil, 

 which thickens and becomes like lard ; it is used for culinary 

 purposes, also for making soap, and by the natives of rank for 

 anointing the body. It is sometimes called Chooree, and 

 forms a considerable article of trade. The flowers abound in 

 honey, scarcely differing in the raw^ state from hive honey, 

 except that it is more limpid. It is manufactured into sugar, in 

 every respect equal to that of the sugar-cane. 2. Bassia 

 latifolia, a tree 40 to 50 feet high and 6 to 7 feet in girth, native 

 of Bengal and other parts of India. Like the preceding, the seeds 

 yield a fatty substance used as butter. The flowers become 

 fleshy, and from them an ardent spirit is distilled. The flowers 

 are eaten raw by the natives in the district of Circars, and are 

 also dried and preserved, forming a considerable article of food. 

 They have further been recently imported into this country for 

 feeding pigs and poultry. A recent writer speaks of it thus : 

 "Any one standing on the dry metamorphic Kharapoor 

 Hills, in the district of Monghyr, 250 miles north-west of 

 Calcutta, and looking on to the plains below, may see 100,000 

 ' Mahwa trees.' Any one fresh from Calcutta would mistake 

 these for Mango trees, whose crops are uncertain ; the Mahwa 

 crop never fails. The part eaten is the succulent corollas 

 which fall in great profusion from the trees in March and 

 April. Then is the feasting time for the humbler members of 

 creation — birds, squirrels, and tree shrews feast among the 

 branches by day, whilst the poor villagers collect the corollas 

 which fall to the ground on all sides ; nor does the feasting end 

 with day, at sunset peacocks and jungle fowl steal out from the 

 surrounding jungle to share the mahwa with deer and bears." 

 During the season of scarcity which prevailed at Behar 

 during 1873-74, the mahwa crop, which was unusually abundant, 

 kept thousands of poor people from starving. 3. Shea Butter 

 (Buiyrospermum Barkii), a tree, native of Western tropical Africa. 

 It attains the height of from 60 to 90 feet, and a circumference 

 of from 6 to 9 feet. The leaves are large and bright green, the 

 fruit is about the size of a peach, but more oblong, consisting of 



