Chap. 54.] 
BALSAMUM. 
149 
person who makes the incision is generally balanced by an 
artificial guide, in order that he may not accidentally inflict a 
wound in the wood beyond the bark. 
A juice distils from the wound, which is known to us 
as opobalsamum ; it is of extraordinary sweetness,'^ but only 
exudes in tiny drops, which are then collected in wool, and 
deposited in small horns. When taken from out of these, the 
substance is placed in new earthen vessels ; it bears a strong 
resemblance to a thick oil, and is of a white colour when fresh. 
It soon, however, turns red, and as it hardens loses its trans- 
parency. When Alexander the Great waged war in those 
parts, it was looked upon as a fair summer day's work to fill a 
single concha'^ with this liquid ; the entire produce of the 
larger garden being six congii, and of the smaller one a single 
congius ; the price, too, at which it was sold was double its 
weight in silver. At the present day the produce of a single 
tree, even, is larger ; the incisions are made three times every 
summer, after which the tree is pruned. 
The cuttings, too, form an article of merchandize : the fifth 
year after the conquest of Judaea, these cuttings, with the 
suckers, were sold for the price of eight hundred thousand 
sesterces. These cuttings are called xylobalsamum,'^^ and are 
boiled down for mixing with unguents, and in the manufac- 
tories have been substituted for the juices of the shrub. The 
bark is also in great request for medicinal purposes, but it is 
the tears that are so particularly valuable ; the seed holding 
'^^ This is said, probably, in allusion to the smell, and not the taste. 
Fee remarks, that Pliny speaks v/ith a considerable degree of exaggeration, 
as its odour is very inferior to that of several balsams which contain ben- 
zoic acid. The balsam obtained by incision, as mentioned by Pliny, is not 
brought to Europe, but only that obtained by the process of decoction ; 
"which is known as balm of Mecca," or of Judaea. It is difficult to believe, 
according to F6e, that it was adulterated with the substances here men- 
tioned by Pliny ; oil of roses having been always a very precious com- 
modity, wax being likely to change its nature entirely, and gums not being 
of a nature to combine with it. Its asserted effects upon milk he states to 
be entirely fabulous ; the statement is derived from Dioscorides. 
The concha, or *' shell," was a Greek and Roman liquid measure, of 
which there were two sizes. The smaller was half a cyathus, .0412 of an 
English pint ; the larger was about three times the size of the former* and 
was known also as the oxybaphura. 
78 Qj. u wood of balsam." It is still known in European commerce by 
its ancient name. The fruit is called Garpobalsamum. 
