276 



THE COPAL-TREE. 



ing up the straight, smooth trunk to secure 

 specimens of wood, bark, and leaf, I was pitilessly 

 assaulted by the Maji-Moto (boiling water), a 

 long ginger-coloured and semi-transparent ant, 

 whose every bite drew blood. Prom the trunk and 

 on the ground I picked up specimens of the gum 

 which exudes from the bole and boughs when 

 injured by elephants, or other causes. This is 

 the Chakazi, raw copal, whence the local ' Jack- 

 ass copal:' it has rarely any ' gooseskin,' and it 

 floats, whilst the older formation sinks, in water. 

 Valueless to us, it produces the magnificent 

 varnishes of China and Japan. In a paper lately 

 read before the Linnsean Society, my friend Dr 

 Eark, H. B. M.'s Acting Consul at Zanzibar, de- 

 clared that the fossil resin when first dug up shows 

 no trace of the characteristic ' goose-skin,' wliich 

 appears only when the surface is cleaned by 

 brushing. I believe that this phenomenon is 

 shown simply by removing the sand which fills 

 up the interstices. But it is hard to make any- 

 thing of Captain Grant's statement — ' the true 

 copal-gum tree is a climber, which ascends to a 

 great height among the forest trees, and finally 

 becomes completely detached from the original 

 root, when the copal exudes from the extremities 

 of these detached roots.' He must allude, not to 



