XXXVlii BOTANY OF SOCOTRA. 



occurring in Socotra is very large. The commonest frankincense in the island 

 is the ameero, but it is not much exported. 



Of myrrh-plants Socotra possesses no less a share. Besides the Balsamo- 

 dendron Makul which yields the Indian ' bdellium ' — the googul or mukul of 

 the Arabians, — there are probably five other species of the genus on the island. 

 Possibly one of these is the Arabian B. opobalsamum, the true myrrh-plant. 

 The myrrh collected is termed leggehen, and is said to be exported. 



So far then as the occurrence of frankincense and myrrh-producing trees 

 is evidence, Socotra may well be the To Nuter of Theban monuments ; for 

 no area known to us of equal extent has so many peculiar forms. 



The most important plant of the island, so far as products are concerned, 

 is the Aloe Perryi, which yields the ' Socotrine aloes ' * of commerce. The gum 

 is known as tdyef by the natives; the Arabs call it sobr. Although this kind 

 of aloes has been so long known, and has the reputation of being finer than 

 either Barbadoes or Cape aloes, it is only within the past few years that the 

 character of the plant has been made known. It grows abundantly on the 

 island, especially on the limestone plateaux. The collection of the gum is a 

 very simple process, and can be accomplished at any season. The collector 

 scrapes a slight hollow on the surface of the ground in the vicinity of an aloe- 

 plant, into which he depresses the centre of a small portion of goat-skin spread 

 over the ground. The leaves of the aloe are then cut and laid in a circle on 

 the skin, with the cut ends projecting over the central hollow. Two or three 

 layers are arranged. The juice, which is of a pale amber colour, with a slightly 

 mawkish odour and taste, trickles from the leaves upon the goat-skin. After about 

 three hours the leaves are exhausted; the skin containing the juice is then 

 removed from beneath them, and the juice is transferred to a mussock. Only 

 the older leaves are used. The juice thus collected is of a thin watery character, 

 and is known as tdyef rhiho, or watery aloes. In this condition it is exported 

 to Muscat and Arabia, and sells for three dollars the skin of 30 lbs. By keep- 

 ing, however, the aloes changes in character. After a month the juice, by loss 

 of water, becomes denser and more viscid ; it is then known as tdyef gesheeshah, 

 and is more valuable — a skin of 30 lbs. fetching five dollars ; whilst in about 

 fifteen days more — that is, about six weeks after collection — it gets into a 

 tolerably hard solid mass, and is then tdyef kasaliul, and is worth seven dollars 

 a skin of 30 lbs. In this last condition it is commonly exported. 



There is, as I have said, no forest on the island, and yet there is one small 

 tree, or large shrub, which may be of some value commercially. It is the 

 metayne, a kind of box-tree, Buxus Hildebrandti. It was first found by 

 Hildebrandt on the Somali-land hills. It forms a hard, compact wood, and, I 

 doubt not, might be used for many of the purposes for which boxwood is so 



* For explanations of this term see Appendix, note under page 292. 



