238 
WEST AFRICAN FORESTS AND FORESTRY 
used for building labourers’ lines and in some European houses. 
In a similar way the leaves themselves have been used as a 
roofing material after being made up into small mats. 
Native Use.—The tree is tapped near the base of the leading 
leaves, or at the base of the male inflorescence, for the produc- 
tion of the sap, which is collected in calabashes. These are placed 
in position every evening and emptied every morning, and 
replaced in position. Occasionally the chimpanzees climb up 
the palms, drink the wine in the calabash and replace it. A 
native once shot a chimpanzee, finding it was the thief of 
his palm wine and not a human being. The wine is of a 
white, sometimes almost creamy colour, and when fresh is 
quite thin and foamy. It has a rather pleasant, sweet, and 
almost sharp taste. After being kept a few days it begins 
to ferment, and even moderate quantities are intoxicating. 
Either fresh or fermented, it is sold in bottles or calabashes 
in the local markets. The supply scarcely, if ever, exceeds 
the demand. The natives often put pieces of the bark of 
Tala, Saccoglottis Gabunensis, in the wine to give it a more 
bitter taste. Occasionally also the bark of mahogany and 
other trees is used. Tala, however, is the correct bark to use, 
and it forms an article of local commerce for this purpose. 
Owing to the comparative inaccessibility of some of the “ stands ” 
of this tree away in the swampy regions near the estuaries 
of some of the larger rivers, such as the Benin and the Siluko, 
there are still vast areas where neither the leaves are cut nor 
the palms tapped for wine. The seeds are boiled and placed 
in the bottom of a canoe, and when sufficient canoes have 
been got together, each with its quota of boiled nuts, these 
are trodden with the feet of those in the canoe, and both the 
nuts and the scaly shell as well as the small amount of yellow 
flesh are thrown in the water of a half-stagnant river. This 
yellow substance partly blinds and stupefies the fish, the smaller 
ones of which come half floating and swimming to the surface, 
the larger ones being washed along near the bed of the 
river. These are caught in convenient places where the river 
has been staked all across its width and bamboo netting put down, 
except for an opening where a flexible net is used. Some 
of the people go about in small canoes, netting the fish that 
come to the surface. One of the most famous spots to see 
this is in the Osse River, in the reach just below Noami, 
where the combined fishery forces of the Jekris and, to a 
lesser extent, Sobos and Ijors, for a day or two in succession 
in April each year, carry on this work. The catch of fish 
obtained is enormous. Unless, however, it can be soon 
