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ISOPTERA RORNEENSIS. 
The Dipterocarpous tree, Isoptera Bo weens* s , is one of the 
sources of^oil nuts producing an important oil known generally 
as M inyak Tenkawang. We are indebted to Mr. John Allan, 
of Warrington, for an account of the habits of the tree and 
the methods of preparing the oil in Pontianak, where he 
has been lately travelling to study the origin of the od seeds of 
the East. 
Isoptera bomeensis (Dipterocarpece ) , is a native of Borneo, 
\ Bangka, and also of Pahang, Muar, and Perak, where 1 have 
occasionally met with it. It is a tree of very large size, fiom ioo 
to 150 feet when full grown, but unlike other Dipterocarpous 
trees it flowers and fruits often when quite small, so that one 
can gather the flowers from the ground. 1 he leaves are bright 
green, oblong, acuminate, 4 inches long and two across, strongly 
ribbed, thin in texture, and glabrous. The flowers in short 
racemes small and yellow, are sweetly scented of vanilla, and in 
Pontianak Mr. Allan says that the women are fond of gather- 
ing them, when the tree is small enough to reach, to put in 
their hair. The flowers are produced in October, the fruits in 
January . The tree usually grows on river banks in wet silt mud 
in which one sinks half-way up the leg. I have, however, seen it 
in drver spots. The fruit is half globular, something like an 
acorn, about half-an-inch long and wide with five rounded ovate 
wings spreading out flat, reddish, and strongly ribbed, three of the 
wings are -jf-inch long, the other two hardly half as big. The 
fruit falls into the streams or rivers near which the tree grows 
and drifts down. The natives of Pontianak catch them in nets, 
or gather them in bends of the river, where there is a block from 
a fallen tree or projecting root. The nuts are then dried in the 
sun and pounded ’in a rice pounder, which here is trough or boat 
shaped. The pounded mass is then Soiled in water and the fat 
/ skimmed off, strained through a simple bamboo strainer and 
poured into joints of bamboo. The fat is hard and waxlike. It 
is used for cooking, imparting a peculiar flavour to the meat, 
and is also used for greasing the copper pans in sago and 
tapioca making, when pearl or bullet sago or tapioca is being 
made. 
The Minyak Tenkawang is also used for soap making in 
Europe, but it is k hard fat and requires much treatment. 
The tree is called Sinkawang in- Muar, and Larat Api in 
Pahang. Burck gi^s its name as Tengkawang Trendah 
in Banka. Mr. AiSan states that it grows in clusters, 
many trees together, which is not usual in Dipterocarpece, though 
it is characteristic of Dryobalanops Camphor the Camphor 
tree. — Ed. 
