OIL OF THE BALANITE. 
85 
This kernel contains much oil^ and the inhabitants of Sene- 
gal extract it for their use when they are short of olive oil. 
I tasted it at St. Louis, and found it tolerably good, but i 
think it might be better if more care were taken in gathering 
the fruit, and expressing the oil. If government were to 
afford encouragement to this culture, this fruit might become 
an important article of commerce. The tree grows every 
where near the Senegal. To extract the oil, the inhabitants 
pound the kernels in a mortar ; when reduced to a paste, 
they make a hole in the middle, into which the oil flows 
speedily and abundantly ; they lade it out by degrees, until 
no more runs ; they then squeeze the paste in their hands, 
and it yields a little more oil, but not so clear as the first. 
A quart of kernels produces about a bottle of oil ; hence it 
might be inferred, how much might be obtained by a better 
process. The negroes eat the pulp of the fruit, either raw 
or baked in the ashes. The trunk of the balanite furnishes 
yellow wood, easily worked, and firm ; the Laobes* make 
mortars, pestles, baganes (large wooden bowls) and many 
other things of it. 
On the 24th of November I was witness to a scene which 
diverted me extremely. I saw a number of women outside 
the camp, who were uttering shrill cries, and some children 
who were throwing stones ; I approached to see what was 
the matter, and found a woman in tears, muffled up in her 
garments, and supported by her friends. While I was in- 
quiring the cause of her affliction, I espied some men and a 
crowd of women at a distance, quarrelling about the loads 
of two oxen ; three slaves with leather straps attacked the 
women when they came near the oxen, and the women in 
their turn laid on with sticks, and pitched off the loads. 
While the men were engaged in replacing them the wo- 
* A wandering tribe, spread all over the western parts of Africa. The 
Laobes are carpenters and pedlars j they are the Jews of this country. 
