#62 Selections. [no. 6, new series, 



as was supposed a small and shrubby thorn nine foot high : from 

 its towering stem canoes sixty feet long have been made and a 

 single trunk has sufficed for the kelson of a brig. The green 

 wood is gummy ; whole flakes at times adhering to the saw. 

 When dried it is well veined of a light tint, and has been used for 

 the pannels of doors : when oiled and polished it darkens to a 

 yellowish-brown. Its small branches freshly cut make good and 

 pliant sticks for chastisement. 



I have the honor to forward the best specimens procurable of 

 the superficial soils, in which the gum is chiefly found, the under- 

 lying blue clay, the reddy earth that is found mixed with the 

 latter, a piece of copal, branch and leaves, and a bit of the gum 

 here called ' ( Damar." Unfortunately the copal tree was not 

 in flower or fruit : the people assured me that it bears a berry not 

 unlike a grain of Indian Corn. 



The merchants of Zanzibar (mostly Germans and Americans) 

 are not likely to throw away an ounce of serviceable copal, and 

 they have consulted the ablest European Technologists upon the 

 subject of preparing it to the best advantage. Supply certainly 

 no longer meets demand, but that golden rule of political economy 

 full of exceptions in civilised regions, in these latitudes becomes a 

 sad fallacy. There is an inexhaustible supply upon the coast 

 of East Africa, but "hands" are wanted. When there is little 

 rain and the ground is hard, the lazy savage will not dig. More- 

 over " Kizkazy copal" — excavated in the N. E. or dry monsoon 

 — annoys merchants by the difficulty of washing off the hard sand 

 which adheres to its surface. Whenever upon the coast there is 

 either a blood feud — and these are a legionary host — or a drought, 

 or a famine, or a pestilence, the people strike work and dollars 

 are offered in vain. 



I must leave, Sir, to your ingenuity the task of remedying these 

 evils. European labourers cannot be employed, the climate of 

 East Africa, as has been abundantly proved is not less injurious 

 to our constitutions than the worst parts of the Western coast. 

 Indian coolies, the only procurable hands, would fear to face the 

 wild men, some of whom I believe to be inveterate canibals. If 



