It was eight o’clock when the camp broke up. We travelled six miles N.N.W., on a soil covered with iron-stone, and three miles over yellow sand. The tree named _balanitis ægyptiaca_, grows here in great abundance; the Senegal negroes call it soump. The Moors collect the fruit of this tree, from the kernel of which they make a kind of sangleh, which they relish much, because it is very greasy. This kernel contains much oil, and the inhabitants of Senegal 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 Laobés[25] make mortars, pestles, baganes (large wooden bowls) and many other things of it.