516 



OLEAGIITOUS PLAOTS. 



whicli, by cold pressure, 703 parts of oil are procured. The seeds are 

 consumed as a cheap popular luxury, being half roasted, and then 

 eaten with salt. The oil is calculated to serve as an efficient 

 and very cheap substitute for olive oil, for pharmaceutical pur- 

 poses. It burns with little smoke, with a clear flame, and affords 

 a very full bright light, answering perfectly in Argand lamps. 



The oil cake affords, also, an excellent food for cattle. 



The ground nut has of late become of considerable impor- 

 tance as an article of exportation, by English houses ; yet more 

 so by Trench houses at Ghent, Kouen, and Bordeaux ; some of 

 whom have contracted with the merchants of the African colonies 

 for large quantities, sending shipping for the cargoes. One house 

 alone contracted for 60,000 bushels in the years 1844 and 1845. 

 This nut oil is so very useful to machinery that the naval steam 

 cruisers on the coast have adopted it. A ground-nut oil factory exists 

 in the colony of Sierra Leone ; but from the want of steam power 

 and proper machinery, and from bad management, together with 

 the inferior attainments of the African artisan, when compared 

 with the European mechanic, and their facilities in quantity or 

 quality, there is abundant scope for improvement. The price in 

 the colony is 4s. 6d. per gallon. It is capable of being refined so 

 as to answer the purpose of a salad oil ; the nut is prolific, and 

 eaten by the natives and Europeans, boiled, roasted, or in its raw 

 state ; and frequently introduced at the table as w-e do the Spanish 

 Barcelona nut at dessert. It grows in the rainy season, and is 

 collected in the dry, and sold in the colony for one shilling to 

 eighteen-pence per bushel, in goods and cash. Form of the nut, 

 long, light shell, contains two kernels covered with a brown 

 rind, when shelled white in appearance. 



It is a low creeping plant, with yellow flowers ; after they drop 

 off!, and the pods begin to form, they bury thems0lves in the earth, 

 where they come to maturity. The pod i^ woody and dry, con- 

 taining from one to three peas, or nuts, as they are called, hence 

 the common names, ground-nut or pea-nut. They require to be 

 parched in an oven before they are eaten, and form a chief article 

 of food in many parts of Africa. 



Erom a narrow strip of land, extending about 40 miles northerly 

 from "Wilmington (North Carolina), comes nearly the entire 

 quantity of earth nuts (known as pea-nuts) grown in the United 

 States for market. Erom that tract and immediate vicinity, 80,000 

 bushels have been carried to Wilmington market in one year. 



The plant has somewhat the appearance of the dwarf garden- 

 pea, though more bushy. It is cultivated in hills. The pea grows 

 on tendrils, which put out from the plant and take root in the 

 earth, where the nut is produced and ripened. The fruit is picked 

 from the root by hand, and the vines are a favorite food for horses, 

 mules, and cattle. From 30 to 80 bushels are produced on an 

 acre. There are some planters who raise from 1,000 to 1,500 

 bushels a year. — (" Hunt's Merchant's Magazine," vol. xv., p. 426.) 



The ground-nut is exceedingly prolific, and requires but little 



