OLEAGINOUS PLANTS, AND THOSE YIELDING FIXED OR ESSENTIAL OILS.
Few cultivators are probably aware of the great importance of oil to
this country, and the number of purposes for which it is employed in
the arts and manufactures. It is extensively used for candle and soap
making, for burning in lamps, for diminishing friction in machinery of
all kinds, and especially for locomotives--in wool-dressing, in the
manufacture of paints and varnishes, as an article of food, for
medicinal purposes, &c.
So important are vegetable oils deemed, that the Society of Arts, in
its prize list for 1851, offered gold medals for the importation or
introduction into this country of any new plants or trees from China,
India, or elsewhere, producing oils or fatty substances, such as can
be used as food, or are applicable to manufacturing purposes; and also
to the person who shall manufacture and import the finest specimen of
oil, not less than ten gallons, the produce of olives grown in any
British colony in Africa or Australasia.
The time of burning of equal quantities of the following oils has been
found to be--
Hours.
Oil of poppy 14
" sunflower 13
" rape 11
" mustard 11½
" flax seed 10
" gold of pleasure
(_Camelina sativa_) 9½
" olives 9
" hemp seed 8
" tallow 10½
FOREIGN VEGETABLE OILS IMPORTED.
1821. 1845. 1850.
tuns. tuns. tuns.
Coco-nut oil -- 2,148 98,040
Olive oil 1,900 12,315 20,783
Palm oil 3,200 25,285 448,589 cwts.
Rape seed oil 800 3,973 --
Linseed oil 10,500 38,634 --
------ ------ -------
16,400 82,355
Fish oils 32,356 22,626 21,328
The total quantity of all kinds of wool annually consumed in England
and Wales, in 1843, was estimated at 801,566 packs. Now, five gallons
of olive, rapeseed or other oils, being used in the preparation of
every pack of wool, for cloth (independent of the quantity used in
soap, applicable to the woollen manufactures), it follows that five
gallons on 801,566 packs are equal to 4,007,830 gallons, or 15,904
tuns; and adding for olive or sperm oil used in machinery 1-11th of
the whole, 1,446 tuns, the total quantity consumed is 17,350
tuns.--("Enderby on the South Whale Fishery.")
_Fixed oils_ are found in the cells and intercellular spaces of the
fruit, leaves, and other parts of plants.
Some of these are drying oils, as linseed oil, from _Linum
usitatissimum_; some are fat oils, as that from olives (fruit of _Olea
sativa_ or _Europæa_); whilst others are solid, as palm oil.
The solid oils or fats procured from plants are, butter of cacao, from
_Theobroma cacao_; of cinnamon from _Cinnamomum verum_; of nutmeg,
from _Myristica moschata_; of coco-nut, from _Cocos nucifera_; of
laurel, from _Laurus nobilis_; of palm oil, from _Elais guianiensis_;
Shea butter, from _Bassia Parkii_; Galam butter, or Ghee, from _Bassia
butyracea_; and vegetable tallow, from _Stillingia sebifera_ in China,
from _Vateria indica_ in Canara and China, and from _Pentadesma
butyracea_ in Sierra Leone, and from the almond. These oils contain a
large amount of stearine, and are used as substitutes for fat. Some of
them are imported in large quantities, and enter into the composition
of soap, candles, &c.
Castor oil, from the seeds of _Ricinus communis_, differs from other
fixed oils in its composition.
Decandolle states the following as the quantity of oil obtained from
various seeds:--
Per cent.
in weight.
Hazel-nut 60
Garden cress 57
Olive 50
Walnut 50
Poppy (_Papaver somniferum_) 48
Almond 46
Caper-spurge (_Euphorbia Lathyris_) 41
Colza (_Brassica oleracea_) 39
White mustard (_Sinapis alba_) 36
Tobacco 34
Plum 33
Woad 30
Hemp 25
Flax 22
Sunflower 15
Buckwheat 14
Grapes 12
The following table, quoted from Boussingault, shows the results of
some experiments made by M. Grauzac, of Dagny:--
Seed produced Oil obtained per
per acre. acre, in lbs. Oil per Cake
cwts. qrs. lbs. lbs. ozs. cent. per cent.
Colewort 19 0 15 875 4 40 54
Rocket 15 1 3 320 8 18 73
Winter rape 16 2 18 641 6 33 62
Swedish turnips 15 1 25 595 8 33 62
Curled colewort 16 2 18 641 6 33 62
Turnip cabbage 13 3 19 565 4 33 61
Gold of pleasure 17 1 16 545 8 27 72
Sunflower 15 3 14 275 0 15 80
Flax 15 1 25 385 0 22 69
White poppy 10 1 18 560 8 46 52
Hemp 7 3 21 229 0 25 70
Summer rape 11 3 17 412 5 30 65
The subjoined list will serve to exhibit the richness of the produce
of different Indian seeds, from which varieties of oil are extracted;
it gives the proportion of oil per cent. in weight:--
Sesame oil (_Sesamum indicum_) 46.7
Black til, coloured variety of ditto (_Verbesena sativa_) 46.4
Gingelie oil (_S. orientale_) 46.7
Ground nuts, produced by _Arachis hypogoea_ 45.5
Wounded seeds obtained from the Poonnay-tree (_Calophyttum
Inophyllum_), a bitter lamp oil 63.7
Karunj seeds, from the _Pongamia glabra_ 26.7
Ram til, the seeds of the nuts Ellu, or _Guizotia oleifera_ 35
Poppy seeds (_Papaver somniferum_) 43 to 58
Silaam, an oil seed from Nepaul 41
Rape seed (_Brassica napus_) 33
The foregoing are not all the seeds from which oil is extracted by the
natives of the East. In addition to this there are cottonseed oil,
used for their lamps. Castor oil and Argemone seed, similarly used.
Oil obtained from the fruit of _Melia Azadriachta_, for medicine and
lamps. Apricot oil in the Himalayas, sunflower oil, oil of
cucumber-seed for cooking and lamps, oil of colocynth seed, a lamp
oil.
The seeds of bastard saffron (_Carthamus tinctorius_) yield oil.
Mustard oil, the produce of various species of _Sinapis_, &c. Shanghae
oil, from _Brassica Chinensis_. Illiepie oil, from _Bassia
longifolia_, which is used for frying cakes, &c., in Madras; and
Muohwa oil, from another species of the same genus in Bengal, _B.
latifolia_. Oil is expressed from the seeds of _Cæsalpina oleosperma_,
a native of the East. The neem tree seeds afford a very clear or
bitter oil, used for burning.
Wood oil is a remarkable substance, obtained from several species of
_Dipterocarpus_, by simply tapping the tree.
The horse-eyes and cacoons of Jamaica (_Fevillea scandens_) yield a
considerable quantity of oil or fat, as white and hard as tallow. It
has been employed for similar purposes on the Mosquito shores.
The seeds of the _Argemone mexicana_, and of the _Sanguinaria
canadensis_, also contain a bland, nutritious, colorless, fixed oil.
The mass from which the seed is expressed is found to be extremely
nutritious to cattle.
The _Camelina sativa_ is cultivated in Europe, for the extraction of
an oil used only by the soap makers, and for lamps.
A solid oil, of a pale greenish color, a good deal resembling the oils
of the Bassia in character, though rather harder, and approaching more
in properties to myrtle wax, was shown at the Great Exhibition, from
Singapore. It is supposed to be the produce of the tallow tree of
Java, called locally "kawan," probably a species of Bassia. It is very
easily bleached; indeed, by exposure to air and light, it becomes
perfectly white; if not too costly, it promises to become a valuable
oil.
According to Mr. Low, there are several varieties of solid oil
commonly used in the Islands of the Archipelago, and obtained from the
seeds of different species of _Dipterocarpus_.
Piney tallow is obtained from the fruit of the _Vateria Indica_, a
large and quick-growing tree, abundant in Malabar and Canara. It is a
white solid oil, fusible at a temperature of 97 degrees, and makes
excellent candles, especially when saponified and distilled in the
manner now adopted with palm oil, &c. It has one great advantage over
coco-nut oil, that the candles made of it do not give out any
suffocating acrid vapors when extinguished, as those made with the
latter oil do.
An oil is produced from the inner shell of the cashew-nut (_Anacardium
occidentale_ var. _indicum_), in the East.
In Japan a kind of butter, called _mijo_, is obtained from a species
of the Dolichos bean (_Dolichos soya_).
The kernel of the seeds of the tallow tree of China, _Stillingia
sebifera_, an evergreen shrub, contains an oil, which, when expressed,
consolidates through the cold to the consistence of tallow, and by
boiling becomes as hard as bees' wax. The plant also yields a bland
oil. A similar fatty product is obtained from a shrub in British
Guiana, the _Myristica (Virola) sebifera_.
Oil is obtained in South America from the sand box tree _(Hura
crepitans_), and from the _Carapa guianensis_.
A fatty oil is obtained in Demerara from the seeds of the butter tree,
_Pekea_ (?) _Bassia butyrosa_, and also from the Saouari (_P.
tuberculosa_).
The fleshy seeds contained in the woody capsules of the Monkey pot
(_Lecythis Tabucajo_), which derive their generic name from their
similarity to an oil jar, are common in the West India Islands and
South America, and yield a considerable quantity of oil.
The seeds of the plants of the cucumber family frequently supply a
bland oil, which is used in the East as a lamp oil and for cooking.
Among the vegetable oils imported into Ningpo, and other Chinese
ports, from Shantong, Leatong, and Teisin, are oil of teuss, obtained
from green and dried peas; black oil of the fruit of the tree _kin_
(?) and oil from the pea of suchau.
The seeds of _Spergula saliva_, a large, smooth-seeded variety of the
common cow spurrey, which is cultivated in Flanders as a pasture grass
and green crop, afford, on expression, a good lamp oil.
A pale brownish yellow oil is obtained from the seeds of _Carthamus
tinctorius_, in Bombay; the seeds contain about 28 per cent. of oil.
Excellent oil is expressed in various parts of India from the seeds of
different species of _Sinapis_, especially from the black mustard
seed. _S. glauca, S. dichotorna_, and _S. juncea_ are extensively
cultivated in the East for their oil. The _Erysimum perfoliatum_ is
cultivated in Japan for its oil-seeds.
A beautiful pale yellow oil is procured from the seeds of the
angular-leaved physic nut, _Jatropha curcas_, a shrub which is often
employed in the tropics as a fence for enclosures. It is used by the
natives in medicine and as a lamp oil. About 700 tons of this oil was
imported into Liverpool in 1850 from Lisbon, for the purpose of
dressing cloth, burning, &c.
A rich yellow oil, perfectly clear and transparent, is obtained from
the seeds of _Bergera koenigii_.
RAPE OIL.--The imports of rape oil, from _Brassica napus_, into
Liverpool, are about 15 to 20 tuns annually.
Rape oil has been found to be better suited than any other oil for the
lubrication of machinery, when properly purified from the mucilage,
&c., which it contains in the raw state. Rape oil is now used
extensively for locomotives, for marine engines, and also for burning
in lamps. It is stated that a locomotive consumes between 90 and 100
gallons of oil yearly; and the annual consumption of oil by the London
and North-Western Railway, for this purpose alone, is more than 40,000
gallons. The oil obtained from good English rape seed is purer and of
superior quality to that from foreign or colonial seed; and as an acre
of land yields nearly five quarters of seed, which is worth at present
50s. per quarter, it is a profitable crop.
Rape seed is now largely imported for expressing oil. The imports,
which in 1847 were but 87,662 quarters, weighing 17,532 tons, had
reached, in 1851, 107,029 quarters, weighing 21,606 tons. The price of
new seed is £25 to £27 the last of ten quarters. The oil is £34 per
tun.
The refuse cake, after the seed is crushed for oil, is in demand as
food for cattle, being worth £4 the ton.
We imported in 1851, from Trance, 289 tuns of rapeseed oil, worth
about £17,000, on which there was no duty levied.
There are exported annually from Hesse Darmstadt, 34,660 cwts. of
poppy and rape oils.
The oil of the colza is much used in Europe, and highly prized. In
France it has been adopted for all the purposes of lighthouses. In
this country it has lately come into extensive domestic use, for
burning in the French moderateur lamps, being retailed at from 3s. 4d.
to 4s. the gallon.
DOMBA OIL.--The Poonay or Palang tree (_Calophyllum Inophyllum_), the
Alexandrian laurel, is a beautiful evergreen, native of the East
Indies, which flourishes luxuriantly on poor sandy soils, in fact
where scarcely anything else will grow. The seeds or berries contain
nearly 60 per cent. of a fragrant, fixed oil, which is used for
burning as well as for medicinal purposes, being considered a cure for
the itch. As commonly prepared it has a dark green color. It is
perfectly fluid at common temperatures, but begins to gelatinise when
cooled below 50 degrees.
THE EARTH-NUT (_Arachis hypogæa, or hypocarpogea_).--This very
singular plant has frequently been confounded with others, partly
through the carelessness of travellers, and by the improper use of
names, which tended to mislead and confuse. Its common appellative,
the earth-nut, has led to the conclusion that it was a species of nut,
such as is known in England under the name of "pig nut," "hawk nut,"
and "ground nut." This, as well as the "earth chesnut," belongs to a
totally different genera. On the Continent and in the East Indies a
similar confusion had long existed by the appellation of "ground
pistachio," which caused the fruit to be confounded with the nut of
the tree _Pistacia vera_. Some resemblance, on the other hand,
existing between these--as well as from their being eaten by different
nations, and used as an article of food, and also for producing
oil--rendered the true description still more difficult. Botanists
are, however, no longer at a loss, having well established the nature
and character of all these plants. The Arachis "nut" partakes of the
nature of the pea or bean of our own country, and is a low annual
plant of the order _Diadelphia decandria_ of Linn.; originally from
Africa, but now extensively cultivated in every quarter of the globe.
It has been naturalised in Europe, and with the climate of the South
of France it may be turned to good account.
It has been said to be indigenous in Florida, Peru, Brazil, and
Surinam; but the plant may be grown on a light sandy soil, under a
moderate heat, equal to that of Italy or the South of France. The
class to which it belongs approaches to the pea tribe; but its
remarkable difference to this, as to the pulse we know as a bean, is
the circumstance of its introducing its fruit or pod--if we may so
call it--into the earth, for the purpose of ripening its seed. The
Arachis, or earth nut, has obtained its name from this operation. The
flowers, leaves, and stems are produced in the ordinary manner we see
in the pea tribe. When the yellow flower has withered and the seed
fertilised, there is nothing left but the bare stem which had
supported it. This stem, in which is the germ of the future fruit and
pod, now grows rapidly in a curved manner, with a tendency to arrive
shortly on the surface of the ground, into which it penetrates this
now naked stem, and sinks into the earth several inches. It is in this
obscure position that the fruit takes its ripened form, and is either
gathered from its hiding place or left to the future season, when its
time of rising into new existence calls it from what was thought its
unnatural position.
When mature, it is of a pale yellow color, wrinkled, and forms an
oblong pod, sometimes contracted in the middle; it contains generally
two seeds. The nuts or peas are a valuable article of food in the
tropical parts of Africa, America, and Asia. They are sweetish and
almond-like, and yield an oil, when pressed, not inferior in use and
quality to that obtained from the olive. The leaf resembles that of
clover, and, like it, affords excellent food for cattle. The cake,
after the oil is expressed, forms an excellent manure.
The Arachis is usually sown in dry, warm weather, from May to June,
and are placed at the distance of eighteen inches from each other.
Insects are fond of them; and if the season is cold and unfavorable to
them, or the growth retarded, they become musty and bad, or are eaten
by insects.
The mode of obtaining the oil is nearly the same as for other pulse or
seeds; and under favorable circumstances the Arachis will produce half
its weight of oil. When heated and pressed the quantity is very
considerably increased. This oil is good for every purpose for which
olive or almond oil is used. For domestic purposes it is esteemed, and
it does not become rancid so quickly as other oils. Experiments have
been made on its inflammable properties, and it is proved that the
brilliancy of light was superior to that of olive oil, and its
durability was likewise proved to be seven minutes per hour beyond the
combustion of the best olive oil, with the additional advantage of
scarcely any smoke. In Cochin-China and India it is used for lamps. It
is known as Bhoe Moong or Moong Phullee in Bengal, and as Japan or
Chinese pulse in Java.
From China this plant was probably introduced into the continent of
India, Ceylon, and the Malayan Archipelago, where it is generally
cultivated.
In South Carolina the seed is roasted and used as chocolate. The
leaves are used medicinally.
It is grown in Jamaica, and there called Pindar nut.
That the culture of the Arachis in warm climates, or even in a
temperate one, under favorable circumstances, should be encouraged,
there can be but one opinion. And when it is considered that its
qualities are able to supersede that of the olive and the almond,
which are but precarious in their crops--to which may be added, that
as a plant it is greedily devoured in the green state by cattle--how
much may it not serve to assist the new settler in regions of the
world which have a climate suited to it.
It is known by various local names--such as _mani manoti_ by the
Spaniards, and has obtained also that of _cacahuete_ in some
countries. It has the additional term _hypogea_ attached to it, which
literally signifies subterranean. This is apt to mislead; for the
plant grows above ground as other pulse, whereas only its seed and
pericarp are inserted, after blooming, into the earth. Hence the
better term _hypocarpogea_.
It appears to form an important article of cultivation along the whole
of the west coast of Africa, and probably on the east coast, on
several parts of which it was found by Loureiro ("Flor. Cochin," p.
430). It was doubtless carried from Africa to various parts of
equinoctial America, for it is noticed in some of the early accounts
of Peru and Brazil. 800 quarters of this nut were imported into
Liverpool from the West Coast of Africa, in 1849, for expressing oil,
and about half that quantity in 1850.
Eighty to 90 tuns of the expressed oil are now annually imported. The
seeds contain about 44 per cent. of a clear pale yellow oil, which is
largely used in India as food, and for lamps, particularly at Malwa
and Bombay, &c. Two varieties are grown in Malacca, the white seed and
the brown seed, and also in Java, in the vicinity of sugar
plantations; the oil cake being used as manure. It is there known as
katjang oil.
This plant, which seems to be a native of many parts of Asia, has
within the last ten years been much cultivated about Calcutta. The
seeds contain abundance of fixed oil, have a faint odor, and very mild
agreeable taste; 1,950 parts of seed, separated from their coverings
and blanched, give 1,405 of kernels, from which, by cold pressure,
703 parts of oil are procured. The seeds are consumed as a cheap
popular luxury, being half roasted, and then eaten with salt. The oil
is calculated to serve as an efficient and very cheap substitute for
olive oil, for pharmaceutical purposes. It burns with little smoke,
with a clear flame, and affords a very full bright light, answering
perfectly in Argand lamps.
The oil cake affords, also, an excellent food for cattle.
The ground nut has of late become of considerable importance as an
article of exportation, by English houses; yet more so by French
houses at Ghent, Rouen, and Bordeaux; some of whom have contracted
with the merchants of the African colonies for large quantities,
sending shipping for the cargoes. One house alone contracted for
60,000 bushels in the years 1844 and 1845. This nut oil is so very
useful to machinery that the naval steam cruisers on the coast have
adopted it. A ground-nut oil factory exists in the colony of Sierra
Leone; but from the want of steam power and proper machinery, and from
bad management, together with the inferior attainments of the African
artisan, when compared with the European mechanic, and their
facilities in quantity or quality, there is abundant scope for
improvement. The price in the colony is 4s. 6d. per gallon. It is
capable of being refined so as to answer the purpose of a salad oil;
the nut is prolific, and eaten by the natives and Europeans, boiled,
roasted, or in its raw state; and frequently introduced at the table
as we do the Spanish Barcelona nut at dessert. It grows in the rainy
season, and is collected in the dry, and sold in the colony for one
shilling to eighteen-pence per bushel, in goods and cash. Form of the
nut, long, light shell, contains two kernels covered with a brown
rind, when shelled white in appearance.
It is a low creeping plant, with yellow flowers; after they drop off,
and the pods begin to form, they bury themselves in the earth, where
they come to maturity. The pod is woody and dry, containing from one
to three peas, or nuts, as they are called, hence the common names,
ground-nut or pea-nut. They require to be parched in an oven before
they are eaten, and form a chief article of food in many parts of
Africa.
From a narrow strip of land, extending about 40 miles northerly from
Wilmington (North Carolina), comes nearly the entire quantity of earth
nuts (known as pea-nuts) grown in the United States for market. From
that tract and immediate vicinity, 80,000 bushels have been carried to
Wilmington market in one year.
The plant has somewhat the appearance of the dwarf garden-pea, though
more bushy. It is cultivated in hills. The pea grows on tendrils,
which put out from the plant and take root in the earth, where the nut
is produced and ripened. The fruit is picked from the root by hand,
and the vines are a favorite food for horses, mules, and cattle. From
30 to 80 bushels are produced on an acre. There are some planters who
raise from 1,000 to 1,500 bushels a year.--("Hunt's Merchant's
Magazine," vol. xv., p. 426.)
The ground-nut is exceedingly prolific, and requires but little care
and attention to its culture, while the oil extracted from it is quite
equal to that yielded by the olive. Almost any kind of soil being
adapted for it, nothing can be more simple than its management. All
that is required is the soil to be turned over and the seed sown in
drills like potatoes; after it begins to shoot it may be earthed with
a hoe or plough. In many parts of Western Australia they are now grown
in gardens for feeding pigs, the rich oil they are capable of yielding
being entirely overlooked. In regard to their marketable value at
home, I will give a copy of a letter of a friend of mine, received
from some London brokers, largely engaged in the African trade:--
"Wilson and Rose present compliments to Mr. N., and beg to inform
him the price of African ground nuts is as under:--Say for River
Gambia, £11 per ton here. Say for Sierra Leone, £10 per ton here.
For ground nuts free on board at the former port, £8 per ton is
demanded; these are the finest description of nut, the freight would
be about £4 per ton; the weight per bushel imperial measure, and in
the shell, is about 25 lbs."
The following, also, is an extract from a letter written in 1842, by
Mr. Forster (the present M.P. for Berwick), an eminent African
merchant. Speaking of the staple of Africa, he says:--
"I have lately been attempting to obtain other oils from the coast,
and it was only yesterday I received from the hands of the oil
presser the result of my most recent experiment on the ground nut,
which I am happy to say is encouraging. I send you a sample of the
oil extracted from them. They are from the Gambia. It is a pure
golden colored oil, with a pleasant flavor, free from the frequent
rancidity of olive oil."
Since then the cultivation has gone on, and the exportation largely
increased. The French also have entered into the trade, and several
vessels are exclusively employed in exporting this product from the
river Gambia, conveying it to oil factors on the continent, who
extract its oil. Seeing, then, the many advantages the cultivation of
such a product bestows, and its adaptation to the soil and climate of
Australia, I cannot refrain from expressing a hope that some of the
influential landowners in the cultivated districts will give the
matter their consideration.
I am informed by an American merchant that he cleared 12,000 dollars
in one year, on the single article of ground or pea nuts obtained from
Africa. Strange as it may appear, nearly all these nuts are
transhipped to France, where they command a ready sale; are there
converted into oil, and thence find their way over the world in the
shape of olive oil; the skill of the French chemists enabling them to
imitate the real Lucca and Florence oil, so as to deceive the nicest
judges. Indeed, the oil from the pea nuts possesses a sweetness and
delicacy that cannot be surpassed.
Advices from the West Coast of Africa to the 16th August, 1853, report
that the ground nut season had closed; the quantity shipped during the
season having exceeded 900,000 bushels. The yield has increased 20 per
cent, each year for the last three years, and it is expected the
increase will be still greater in the forthcoming season.
TEUSS OIL.--The Chinese use what is called teuss or tea oil, for food
and other purposes. I have alluded to it under the head of pulse, at
page 312. It is obtained, however, from a species of the ground nut,
and is sold in Hong Kong, at 2s. 6d. the gallon, being imported from
the main land. By a local ordinance it is imperative on every
householder at Victoria, Hong-Kong, to have a lamp burning over his
door at night. When burning, this oil affords a clear, bright light,
and is not so offensive to the smell as train and other common lamp
oils.
TOBACCO SEED OIL.--A discovery, which may prove of some commercial
importance, appears to have been made by a British resident in Russia,
namely, that the seed of the tobacco plant contains about fifteen per
cent. of an oil possessing peculiar drying properties, calculated to
render it a superior medium, especially for paints and varnishes. The
process employed for the extraction of the oil is to reduce the seed
to powder, and knead it into a stiff paste with _quantum sufficit_ of
hot water, and then submit it to the action of strong fires. The oil
thus obtained is exposed to a moderate heat, which, by coagulating the
vegetable albumen of the seed, causes all impurities contained in the
oil to form a cake at the bottom of the vessel employed, leaving the
oil perfectly limpid and clear.
POPPY OIL.--About 80 cwt. of poppy seed is imported annually into
Hull, and small quantities come into other ports to be crushed into
oil. The seeds of the poppy yield, by expression, 56 per cent. of a
bland and very valuable oil, of a pale golden color, fluid to within
ten degrees of the freezing point of water. It dries easily, is
inodorous, and of an agreeable flavor like olive oil.
Dr. J.V.C. Smith, writing from Switzerland, to the editor of the
"Boston Medical Journal," says:--
"Immense crops are raised here of articles wholly unknown to the
American farmers, and perhaps the kinds best fitted to particular
localities where grain and potatoes yield poorly under the best
efforts. One of these is poppies. Thousands of acres are at this
moment ready for market--which the traveller takes for granted, as
he hurries by, are to be manufactured into opium. They are not,
however, intended for medical use at all, but for a widely different
purpose. From the poppy seed a beautiful transparent oil is made,
which is extensively used in house painting. It is almost as
colorless as water, and possesses so many advantages over the flax
seed oil that it may ultimately supersede that article. Where flax
cannot be grown poppies often can be, in poor sandy soil. Linseed
oil is becoming dearer, and the demand for paint is increasing. With
white lead, poppy oil leaves a beautiful surface, which does not
afterwards change, by the action of light, into a dirty yellow.
Another season some one should make a beginning at home in this
important branch of industry. The oil may be used for other
purposes, and even put in the cruet for salads."
TALLICOONAH or KUNDAH OIL, is obtained from the seeds of the _Carapa
Touloucouna_ (of the Flore de Senegambie). The tree grows to the
height of 40 feet; the fruit is a large, somewhat globular five-celled
capsule. The seeds (of which there are from 18 to 30 in each capsule),
vary in size from that of a chesnut to a hen's egg. They are
three-cornered, of a brownish or blackish red color. It is found
abundantly in the Timneh country, and over the colony of Sierra Leone.
It is manufactured in the following manner:--The nuts having been well
dried in the sun, are hung up in wicker racks or hurdles, and exposed
to the smoke of the huts, after which they are roasted and subjected
to trituration in large wooden mortars, until reduced to a pulp. The
mass is then boiled, when the supernatant oil is removed by skimming.
The natives principally prepare the oil to afford light; the leaves
are used by the Kroomen as a thatch. It is held in high estimation as
an anthelmintic. The oil is sold in Sierra Leone at 2s. a gallon, and
could be procured in abundance from the coast as an article of
commerce.
CARAP or CRAB OIL (_Carapa guianensis_).--This is a sort of vegetable
butter, being sometimes solid and sometimes half fluid, which is
obtained from the seed of a large tree abundant in the forests of
Guiana, and also found in Trinidad. It is said to turn rancid very
soon when exposed to the air, but this is probably caused by the
presence of impurities, arising from the crude and imperfect way in
which it is prepared by the natives, who boil the kernels, leave them
in a heap for a few days, then skim them, and lastly reduce them into
a paste in a wooden mortar, which is then spread on an inclined board,
and exposed to the heat of the sun, so that the oil may melt and
gradually trickle down into a vessel placed below to receive it. A
prize medal was awarded for this oil at the Great Exhibition in 1851.
Carap oil in Trinidad is highly esteemed as an unguent for the hair,
and also for applying to the wounds of animals, for destroying ticks
and other insects which infest cattle--also for the cure of
rheumatism. An oil called Carap oil is also obtained in the East, from
the almonds of _Xylocarpus granatum_, or _Carapa Molluccensis_, of
Lanark, which is used by the natives to dress the hair and anoint the
skin, so as to keep off insects.
Cacao fat, the butter-like substance obtained from the seeds of
_Theobroma cacao_, is esteemed as an emollient.
The nuts of the Great Macaw tree (_Acrocomia fusiformis_), a majestic
species of palm, furnishes much oil. This tree is the _Cocos
fusiformis_, of Jacquin, and other intertropical botanists. It is a
native of Trinidad and Jamaica, and is found also very commonly in
South America.
The method of extracting the oil is as follows:--The nut or kernel is
slightly roasted and cleaned, then ground to a paste, first in a mill,
and then on a livigating stone. This paste, gently heated and mixed
with 3-10ths of its weight of boiling water, is put into a bag, and
the oil expressed between two heated plates of iron; it yields about
7-10ths or 8-10ths of oil. If discolored it can be purified, when
melted, by filtration. It is then of the consistence of butter, of a
golden yellow hue, the odor that of violets, and the taste sweetish.
If well preserved it will keep several years without spoiling, which
is known to have taken place by the loss of its golden hue and
delightful aroma.
It is frequently sold in the shops as palm oil, and of late has
entered largely into the composition of toilet soaps. As an emollient
it is said to be useful in some painful affections of the joints; the
negroes deem it a sovereign remedy in "bone ache." The nut itself is
sometimes fancifully carved by the negroes, and is highly ornamental,
being of a shining jet black, and susceptible of a very high polish.
This tree may be increased from suckers.
_A. sclerocarpa_ is the Macahuba palm of Brazil.
THE AGAITI, as it is called by the Portuguese, or napoota by the
natives and Arabs (_Didynamia Gymosperma?_), much cultivated in all
Eastern Africa for its oil, which is considered equal to that of
olives, and fetches as high a price in the Indian market. The plant,
which is as tall and rank as hemp, and equally productive, having
numerous pods throughout the stems, is found everywhere in a wild as
well as cultivated state.
The "Cape Shipping Gazette," of August, 1850, says:--
"The attention of the George Agricultural and Horticultural Society
having been drawn to the fact that an excellent oil, equal to the
olive oil of Italy, can be extracted from the kernel of the fruit
known by the name of "T Kou Pijte" and "Pruim Besje," they have
offered a reward of £10 for the best sample, not less than a half
aum of this oil--and £15 if it shall be adjudged equal to the best
oil of Italy. This fact is deserving of notice, as an instance of
the advantages which are likely to result from the attention now
being devoted to the natural productions of the colony."
_Madia sativa_ is a handsome annual plant, native of Chili, which has
been naturalised in Europe. It grows about two feet high, and produces
flowers in July and August, of a pale yellow color.
The whole plant is viscid and exhales a powerful odor, which is
somewhat like heated honey. It requires rather a rich soil, of a
ferruginous character. The root is fusiform, the stem cylindrical, and
furnished with sessile, three to five longitudinally-nerved leaves,
which are apposite on the lower portion of the stem, and alternate on
the upper. M. Victor Pasquier, who has written on the culture of the
plant, analysed the seed, and found 100 parts to consist of 26.5 of
testa, and 73.5 of kernel; 100 parts of the latter yielded 31.3 of
vegetable albumen, gum, and lignine, 56.0 of _fixed oil_, and 12.5 of
water. In dry seasons the oil is both more abundant and better than in
damp seasons. The produce of oil, compared with that of the poppy, is
equal; with colza, as 32 to 28; with linseed, 32 to 21; with the
olive, 32 to 16.
The leaves and stems of this plant are rejected by cattle; but the
oil-cake, which always contains a considerable portion of the oil,
forms a nutritive food, of which they are very fond. The oil expressed
without heat is transparent, of a golden yellow color, inodorous,
rather fatter than the oil of rape or olives, and of a soft,
agreeable, nutty taste. It is fit to be employed in the preparation of
food, in salads, and for all the purposes of the best and mildest
fixed oils. It burns with a brilliant, reddish-white flame, and leaves
no residue. It is little liable to become rancid, and is completely
decolorised by animal charcoal.
The oil of the seeds of this plant, now extensively cultivated in
France, will yield, according to the observations of Braconnet, a
solid soap, similar to that made from olive oil. Boussingault obtained
from the oil a solid, as well as a fluid acid. The solid one is
probably palmic acid, it fuses at exactly 140 degrees of Fahrenheit.
The fluid acid in its properties resembles the oleic acid discovered
by Chevreul, and seems to dry easily.
The following is the composition of each, as determined by his
analysis:--
Solid acid. Fluid acid.
Carbon 74.2 76.0
Hydrogen 12.0 11.0
Oxygen 13.8 13.0
------ ------
100. 100.
COCUM OIL, or butter, is obtained from the seeds of a kind of
mangosteen (_Garcinia purpurea_), and used in various parts of India
to adulterate ghee or butter. It is said to be exported to England for
the purpose of mixing with bears' grease in the manufacture of
pomatum. It is a white, or pale greenish yellow, solid oil, brittle,
or rather friable, having a faint but not unpleasant smell, melting at
about 95 degrees, and when cooled after fusion remaining liquid to 75
degrees.
An excellent solid oil, of a bright green color, is obtained from
Bombay, having a consistence intermediate between that of tallow and
wax, fusible at about 95 degrees, and easily bleached; it has a
peculiar and somewhat aromatic odor. There is some uncertainty as to
the plant from which it is obtained. It was referred to the _Salvadora
persica_, and to the _Vernonia Anthelminticea_, a plant common in
Guzerat and the Concan Ghats.
A pale yellow clear oil is obtained from the seed of _Dolichos
biflorus_(_?_). Oil is also expressed in India from the seed of the
_Argemone mexicana_, which is used for lamps and in medicine; and from
the seeds of the cashew nut (_Anacardium occidentale_), from _Sapindus
marginatus_, and the country walnut (_Aleurites triloba_.) The fruit
of the _Chirongia sapinda_, (or _Buchanania latifolia_,) yields oil.
From the seeds of the _Pongamia glabra_, or _Galidupa arborea_, a
honey brown and almost tasteless oil is procured, which is fluid at
common temperatures, but gelatinises at 55 degrees.
Other sources of oil are the _Celastrus paniculatus_ (_?_) _Balanites
Egyptictca_ and the saul tree (_Shorea Robusta_).
THE CANDLE-TREE or PALO BE VELAS, (_Parmentiera cereifera_,
Seemann.)--This tree, in the valley of the Chagres, South America,
forms entire forests. In entering them a person might almost fancy
himself transported into a chandler's shop. From all the stems and
lower branches hang long cylindrical fruits, of a yellow wax color, so
much resembling a candle as to have given rise to the popular
appellation. The fruit is generally from two to three, but not
unfrequently four feet long, and an inch in diameter. The tree itself
is about 24 feet high, with, opposite trifoliated leaves, and large
white blossoms, which appear throughout the year, but are in greatest
abundance during the rainy season. The _Palo de Velas_ belongs to the
natural order _Crescentiaceae_, and is a _Parmentiera_, of which genus
hitherto only one species, the _P. edulis_, of De Candolle, was known
to exist. The fruit of the latter, called _Quauhscilote_, is eaten by
the Mexicans, while that of the former serves for food to numerous
herds of cattle. Bullocks especially, if fed with the fruit of this
tree, guinea-grass, and _Batatilla_ (_Ipomoea brachypoda_, Benth.),
soon get fat. It is generally admitted, however, that the meat
partakes in some degree of the peculiar apple-like smell of the fruit,
but this is by no means disagreeable, and easily prevented, if, for a
few days previous to killing the animal, the food is changed. The tree
produces its principal harvest during the dry season, when all the
herbaceous vegetation is burned up, and on that account its
cultivation in tropical countries is especially to be recommended; a
few acres of it would effectually prevent that want of fodder which is
always most severely felt after the periodical rains have
ceased.--("Hooker's Journal of Botany.")
CINNAMON SUET is extracted by boiling the fruit of the cinnamon. An
oily fluid floats on the surface, which on cooling subsides to the
bottom of the vessel, and hardens into a substance like mutton suet.
The Singhalese make a kind of candles with it, and use it for culinary
purposes. It emits a very pleasant aroma while burning. According to
the analysis of Dr. Christison, it contains eight per cent, of a fluid
not unlike olive oil; the remainder is a waxy principle.
CROTON OIL is obtained by expression from the seeds or nuts of _Croton
Tiglium_, an evergreen tree, 15 to 20 feet in height, belonging to the
same order as the castor oil plant, producing whitish green flowers,
and seeds resembling a tick in appearance, whence its generic name. It
is a native of the East Indies. 100 parts of seeds afford about 64 of
kernel. 50 quarters of croton nuts for expressing oil were imported
into Liverpool from the Cape Verd Islands, in 1849.
The _Croton Tiglium_ grows plentifully in Ceylon, and the oil, if
properly expressed, might be made an article of trade. The best mode
of preparing it is by grinding the seeds, placing the powder in bags,
and pressing between plates of iron; allow the oil to stand for
fifteen days, then filter. The residue of the expression is triturated
with twice its weight of alcohol, and heated on the sand-bath from 120
to 140 degs. Fahrenheit, and the mixture pressed again. In this step
the utmost caution is necessary in avoiding the acrid fumes. One seer
of seed furnishes by this process rather more than eleven fluid ounces
of oil, six by the first step, and five by alcohol.
The oil acts as an irritant purgative in the dose of one drop. In
large doses it is a dangerous poison. When applied externally it
produces pustules.
In 1845, eight cases of croton oil and six cases of the seed were
exported from Ceylon.
Other species of Croton, as _C. Pavana_, a native of Ava and the
north-eastern parts of Bengal, and _C. Roxburghii_, yield a purgative
oil. The bark of _C. Eleuteria_, _C. Cascarilla_, and other species is
aromatic, and acts as a tonic and stimulant. It forms the cascarilla
bark of commerce already spoken of. When bruised, it gives out a musky
odor and is often used in pastilles.
The oil obtained from the seeds of _Jatropha curcas_, a native of
South America and Asia, is purgative and emetic, and analagous in its
properties to croton oil. It is said to be a valuable external
application in itch. In India it is used for lamps.
OIL OF BEN, known as Sohrinja in Bengal, and Muringo in Malabar is
obtained from the seeds or nuts of the horseradish tree, _Moringa
pterygosperma_, Burmann; the _Hyperanthera Moringa_, of Linnæus. This
clear limpid oil having no perceptible smell, is much esteemed by
watchmakers and perfumers; it is expensive and not often to be
procured pure, consequently the oil would be a very profitable export.
It grows rapidly and luxuriantly everywhere in Jamaica, particularly
on the north side of the island--as well as Trinidad and other
quarters of the West. It is easily propagated either by cuttings from
the tree (the branches) or by seeds, and bears the second year. The
produce of each tree may be estimated at from one to two gallons. From
the flowers a very pleasant perfume might be easily distilled.
The following account I derive from my friend Dr. Hamilton--
"It is a small tree, of about twenty feet in height, of most rapid
growth, coming into flower within a few months after it has been
sown, and continuing to produce seeds and blossoms afterwards
throughout the year. The tree is now naturalised in the West Indies.
The timber is said to dye a fine blue, and the gum, which, exudes
from wounds in the bark, bears a strong resemblance to that obtained
from the _Astragalus tragacantha_, for which it might, no doubt, be
substituted.
The numerous racemes of white blossoms with which the tree is
constantly loaded, are succeeded by long triangular pods, somewhat
tourlose at the ends, and about two feet in length, when arrived at
the full growth. These pods, while yet young and tender, are not
unfrequently cooked and served up at the planter's tables like
asparagus, for which they are not a bad substitute. The pods, when
full grown, contain about fifteen seeds; each considerably larger
than a pea, with a membraneous covering expanding into three wings,
whence the specific name of _pterygosperma_. On removing the winged
envelope the seeds appear somewhat like pith balls; but upon
dividing them with the nail, they are found to abound in a clear,
colorless, tasteless, scentless oil, of which the proportion is so
large that it may be expressed from good fresh seeds by the simple
pressure of the nail. Geoffry informs us, that he obtained 30½
ounces of oil from eight pounds of the decorticated seeds, being at
the rate of very nearly 24 lbs. of oil from 100 lbs. of seed.
Notwithstanding the great value of its oil, and the facility with
which it can be obtained in the West Indies, the moringa has been
hitherto valued merely as an ornamental shrub, and cultivated for
the sake of its young pods or the horseradish of its roots, as
luxuries for the table.
The oil is peculiarly valuable for the formation of ointments, from
its capability of being kept for almost any length of time without
entering into combination with oxygen. This property, together with
the total absence of color, smell, and taste, peculiarly adapts it
to the purposes of the perfumer, who is able to make it the medium
for arresting the flight of those highly volatile particles of
essential oil, which constitute the aroma of many of the most
odoriferous flowers, and cannot be obtained by any other means, in a
concentrated and permanent form. To effect this, the petals of the
flowers, whose odor it is desired to obtain, are thinly spread over
flakes of cotton wool saturated with this oil, and the whole
enclosed in air tight tin cases, where they are suffered to remain
till they begin to wither, when they are replaced by fresh ones, and
the process thus continued till the oil has absorbed as much as was
desired of the aroma; it is then separated from the wool by
pressure, and preserved under the name of _essence_, in well stopped
bottles.
By digesting the oil thus impregnated in alcohol, which does not
take up the fixed oil, a solution of the aroma is effected in the
spirit, and many odoriferous tinctures or waters, as they are
somewhat inaccurately termed, prepared. By this process most
delicious perfumes might be obtained from the flowers of the _Acacia
tortuosa_, _Pancratium carribeum_, _Plumeria alba_, _Plumeria
rubra_, and innumerable other flowers, of the most exquisite
fragrance, which abound within the tropics, blooming unregarded, and
wasting their odors on the barren air."
THE OIL PALM.
There are several species of this genus of beautiful palms of the
tribe _Cococinæ_, but that chiefly turned to account is _Elais
guineensis_, a native of the Coast of Guinea to the south of Fernando
Po, which furnishes the best oil.
There are three other varieties--_E. melanococca_, a native of New
Granada, _E. Pernambucana_, common on the coast of Brazil, and _J.
occidentalis_, indigenous to Jamaica. All the species grow well in a
sandy loam and may be increased by suckers.
The value of the oil of this palm, as an article of commerce, is
exemplified by the large annual imports, averaging more than 516,000
cwt. for many years past.
Our supplies of palm oil are almost wholly derived from the West Coast
of Africa, of which it is the staple article of export.
Palm oil has the greatest specific gravity of any of the fixed
vegetable oils. It is used principally in this country for making
yellow soap. But the inhabitants of the Guinea coast employ it for the
same purposes that we do butter.
The trade in palm oil has almost driven out the slave trade from the
Bight of Benin, which was a few years ago one of its principal seats.
The old slave traders at Whydah have generally gone into the palm oil
trade, and are carrying it on to a very great extent. In August 1849,
no less than twelve vessels were lying at that port taking in oil;
whilst, only three years before, it was rare to see three vessels
there at once, and of those in all probability two would be slavers.
This palm is called Maba by the natives about the Congo river. It is
moneocious, which indeed Jacquin, by whom the genus was established,
concluded it to be, although first described as dioecious by Gaertner,
whose account has been adopted, probably without examination, by
Schroder, Willdenow, and Persoon.
The average imports of this oil into Liverpool alone, have now been
for some years upwards of 18,000 tons, worth nearly £800,000 sterling,
and giving employment to upwards of 30,000 tons of shipping; thus
proving that the natives who formerly exported their brethren as a
matter of traffic, now find, at least, an equally profitable trade in
the exportation of the vegetable products of their native soil.
Palm oil is produced by the nut of the tree, which grows in the
greatest abundance throughout Western Africa. The demand for it, both
in Europe and America, is daily increasing, and there is no doubt it
will, ere long, become the most important article of African trade.
IMPORTS INTO LIVERPOOL.
casks. tons.
1835 28,500 9,500
1836 33,500 11,000
1837 26,000 9,900
1838 27,520 10,320
1839 36,500 14,300
1852 about -- 23,500
In the colony of Liberia, I notice the manufacture of a new article of
African production, which is called "Herring's Palm Kernel Oil or
African Lard." It is thus spoken of in the newspapers of that Republic
:--
We had been for a long time impressed with an idea that the oil
contained in the kernel of the palm nut, was superior both in
quality and appearance to that of palm oil, which is obtained from
the exterior part.
On making an effort to extract the oil from the kernel (which was by
means of a little machine, of our own invention and contrivance), we
found that our thoughts upon the matter were correct, that the oil
possessed admirable beauty in its appearance, with a taste, when
used for cooking purposes, unexcelled by that of the best lard.
After being made and set by, it assumes a consistence like that of
hard butter, and has to be cut out with a knife or spoon; its
appearance in this state is very beautiful, presenting such
richness, clearness, and adaptedness to table purposes, that one
would not suppose that this oil is obtained from the same tree from
which palm oil is, for there is as much disparity both in their
appearance and taste as there is between lard and butter.
The exquisite transparency which the kernel oil bears in a liquid
state, especially when undergoing the purifying process, is a cause
of admiration. On showing some of it to several foreigners, I was
asked in two instances which was the oil and which the water, or
whether it was oil or water; thus you may have an idea of its
clearness. We make two qualities of this oil, differing however in
taste only, the one being for table uses and the other for
exportation and for whatever use they may choose to put it to
abroad.
There have been many conjectures in respect to the uses to which
this oil might he put in foreign countries; but that it will be a
useful article, and especially in our trade, when made more
extensively, there can be no doubt, for the quantity in which it
might be had would undoubtedly introduce it to a respectable rank
among the other commodities of our productive country so eagerly
sought after.
There is nothing, to my knowledge, that can be turned to as good
account and at the same time so abundant and easily obtained, as the
palm kernel, for they are as common as the pebbles of stony land,
especially in this section of the country, where we have palm
orchards of spontaneous growth for miles together, and interspersing
the surrounding country in almost innumerable numbers.
According to statistical ascertainment, there is on an average
exported from this port, thirty thousand gallons of palm oil
annually, from which fact we ascertain demonstratively that the palm
kernels which are thrown away here (leaving out the whole leeward
coast of our possessions) are sufficient to make thirty thousand
gallons of oil, more or less. This is not at all a problematical
speculation of ours, but we feel authorised to advance this
assertion from the fact that one bushel of kernels, completely
worked up, will make two gallons of oil. But to work them up is the
thing, plentiful as they are; we however, hesitate not to say, that
it can be done and probably will be.
Having now so far conquered the difficulties attending the
manufacture of this oil, as that we can safely vouch a reasonable
supply for home consumption, we most cheerfully recommend it to the
citizens of this Republic, whose demands for it, for eating
purposes, we doubt not can be supplied, and on very reasonable
terms.
We will assure our customers that there will not be an ounce of dirt
or sediment in a hundred pounds of our oil.
The recent abolition of the soap duty, by stimulating the demand for
palm oil, will have an instant effect on the trade and commerce of
Western Africa, by confirming the suppression of the slave trade, and
giving an additional impetus to negro improvement. It will also
increase the production for England of ground nuts, whence the oil so
largely used in making continental soaps is expressed. "When (observes
a recent writer) the Portuguese first treated with that coast, they
found palm oil and ground nuts articles of native food, and so they
remained down to a period within living memory. So used, they neither
required any cultivation nor gave rise to any notions of property.
Though whole tracts of country are crowded by the oil-palm tree,
little care was taken of what was, in fact, superabundant; and as for
ground nuts, they were simply dug up as prudence or necessity
dictated. Some thirty years ago a cask or two of palm oil was sent
home from the Gold Coast; it met so ready a sale that it was further
inquired after, and the total amount now imported into England ranges
from 25,000 to 30,000 tons annually. The exportation of ground nuts is
even larger; but, owing to our excise on soap, they had heretofore
gone principally to France---to Marseilles especially.
"Of these two articles, it is to be observed, the Western Coast of
Africa appears to have a monopoly; and with respect to palm oil, it is
further to be remarked, that it is exactly behind those ports and up
those rivers, which were formerly the great nests of the slave trade,
that its production is largest; and just as the slave trade there has
been crushed, a commerce in palm oil has sprung up and replaced it.
There are men alive who recollect the slave trade flourishing on the
Gold Coast; it has long been extinct there, and palm oil is now
largely exported. It is but a very few years ago since that traffic
appeared to be irrepressible at the mouths of the Niger: it is now
expelled, and thence Liverpool obtains, instead, its supplies of palm
oil. So also, later still, at Whydah, and the other ports of the
kingdom of Dahomy, and along the Lagoon, which connects Dahomy with
the Benin River, there the Spanish slave dealers are themselves
inaugurating a commerce in palm oil. Already the trade in that quarter
is considerable, and it would have extended much more rapidly than it
has done, were it not that disorder and warfare in the interior have
been promoted and prolonged by the indiscreet zeal of some of our own
naval officers and by the desire of some of our missionaries to rule
at Abeeokutu, at Lagos, and at Badagray. When, however, order and
tranquillity are restored, a most important trade will undoubtedly
arise there. A generation ago, when palm oil was merely an article of
food, there was, we have said, no property in palm trees. Since,
however, a large foreign demand has arisen for this oil, the
plantations, as already they are called, begin to be cared for; and
lately the title to some of them has been disputed in our courts on
the Gold Coast: a contention which constitutes the first evidence we
have received of the value of land, not actually under their own
cultivation, being recognised by the natives. Thus the feeling of
property and the desire for accumulation are springing up out of the
palm oil trade; and they are everywhere the germs of nascent
civilisation. It is no light question, therefore, thus involved in an
increased demand for this article; it may produce African consequences
of incalculable importance to the whole human race. It is in France
hitherto that the great consumption of ground nut oil has occurred. It
is there used in the manufacture of soaps, which, though preferred
abroad, are little used in England--very much because of the Excise
laws. The specific gravity of the soap made out of ground nut oil is
higher than those laws permitted; in consequence we could neither make
it for our own use nor for foreign exportation; and thus France has
substantially the soap trade of the world. By the repeal of the duty,
England will be enabled to compete--in this, as in all other
trades--with France abroad."
The price, in Liverpool, for palm oil, in October, 1853, was £38 10s.
to £39 per ton.
We export annually nearly four million gallons of oil made from
linseed, hemp seed, and rape seed.
PALM OIL RETAINED FOR HOME CONSUMPTION
cwts.
1835 242,733
1836 234,357
1837 211,919
1838 272,991
1839 262,910
1840 314,881
1841 300,770
1842 353,672
1843 377,765
1844 363,335
1848 510,218
1849 493,331
1850 448,589
1851 493,598
1852 408,577
The quantity of the four principal vegetable oils annually imported
into Great Britain, is shown by the following figures:--
Palm oil. Coco-nut oil. Castor oil. Olive oil.
cwts. cwts. cwts. tuns.
1848 510,218 85,463 4,588 10,086
1849 493,331 64,452 9,681 16,964
1850 448,589 98,040 -- 20,738
1851 608,550 55,995 -- 11,503
1852 623,231 101,863 -- 8,898
THE OLIVE-TREE (_Olea Europea_).--There are several varieties of this
plant, two of which have been long distinguished--the wild and the
cultivated. The former is an evergreen shrub or low tree, with spiny
branches and round twigs; the latter is a taller tree, without
spines, and with four-angled twigs. The fruit is a drupe about the
size and color of a damson. Its fleshy pericarp yields by expression
olive oil, of which the finest comes from Provence and Florence.
Spanish or Castile soap is made by mixing olive oil and soda, while
soft soap is made by mixing the oil with potash.
The wild olive is indigenous to Syria, Greece, and Africa, on the
lower slopes of Mount Atlas. The cultivated species grows
spontaneously in Syria, and is easily reared in Spain, Italy and the
South of France, various parts of Australia and the Ionian Islands.
Wherever it has been tried on the sea-coasts of Australia, the success
has been most complete. There are several fine trees near Adelaide,
some of them fourteen feet high, bearing fruit in abundance.
Unfortunately no one has attempted to cultivate the plant on a large
scale, but in a few years Australia ought to suply herself with olive
oil.
The olive tree is also grown in Hong-Kong.
There are five or six varieties of _O. Europoea_, or _sativa_, grown in
the south of Europe, of which district they are for the most part
natives.
The entire exports of olive oil from the kingdom of Naples have been
estimated at 36,333 tuns a year, which, taken at its mean value when
exported at £62 per tun, is equivalent to the annual sum of
£2,252,646.
There are one or two distinct species, natives of the East Indies and
the Cape of Good Hope. This genus of plants, besides their valuable
products of oil and fruit, are also much admired for the fragrance of
their white flowers. There is a yellow-blossomed variety, native of
China, _O. fragrans_, the Lan-hoa of the Chinese, which is used to
perfume their teas.
Olive oil now forms an article of export from Chili, being grown in
most parts of that republic, particularly in the vicinity of St. Jago,
where trees of three feet in diameter, and of a proportionate height,
are common. The olive was first carried from Andalusia to Peru in
1560, by Antonio de Ribera, of Lima. Frezier speaks of the olive being
used for oil in Chili, a century and a half ago.
The culture of the olive has been recommended for Florida and most of
the Southern States of America. Formerly, on account of its slow
growth, the olive was not considered very useful; but some years since
a new variety was introduced into France, and into some parts of Spain
and Portugal, which yields an abundant crop of fruit the second year
after planting. They are small trees or rather shrubs, about four or
five feet high. The fruit is larger than the common olive, is of a
fine green color when ripe, and contains a great deal of oil, The
advantages accruing from this new mode of cultivating the olive tree,
are beyond all calculation. By the old method an olive tree does not
attain its full growth, and consequently does not yield any
considerable crop under thirty years; whereas the new system of
cultivating dwarf trees, especially from cuttings, affords very
abundant crops in two or three. An acre of land can easily grow 2,500
trees of the new variety, and the gathering of the fruit is easy, as
it can be done by small children. At Beaufort, South Carolina, the
olive is cultivated from plants which were obtained in the
neighbourhood of Florence, Italy.
A gentleman in Mississippi is stated, by an American agricultural
journal, to have olive trees growing, which at five years from the
cutting bore fruit, and were as large at that age as they usually are
in Europe at eight years old. The olive then, it is added, will yield
a fair crop for oil at four years from the nursery, and in eight years
a full crop, or as much as in Europe at from fifteen to twenty years
of age.
The lands and climate there are stated to be as well adapted to the
successful cultivation of the olive for oil, pickles, &c., as any part
of Europe. Some hundreds of the trees are grown in South Carolina, and
the owner expressed his conviction that this product would succeed
well on the sea-coast of Carolina and Georgia. The frosts, though
severe, did not destroy or injure them, and in one case, when the
plant was supposed to be dead, and corn was planted in its stead, its
roots sent out shoots. It is well known to be a tree of great
longevity, even reaching to 1,000 or 1,200 years; so that, when once
established, it will produce crops for a great while afterwards. The
expense of extracting the oil is also stated to be but trifling.
The olive is of slow growth; trees 80 years of age measure only from
27 to 30 inches in circumference at the lower part of their trunks. An
olive tree is mentioned by M. Decandolle as measuring above 23 feet in
circumference, which, judging from the above inferences, may be safely
estimated at 700 years old. Two other colossal olives are recorded,
one at Hieres, measuring in circumference 36 feet, and one near Genoa,
measuring 38 feet 2 inches. The produce in fruit and oil is regulated
by the age of the trees, which are frequently little fortunes to their
owners. One at Villefranche produces on an average, in good seasons,
from 200 to 230 pounds of oil. The tree at Hieres, above-mentioned,
produces about 55 imperial gallons.
The olive is found everywhere along the coast of Morocco, but
particularly to the south. The trees are planted in rows, which form
alleys, the more agreeable because the trees are large, round, and
high in proportion. They take care to water them, the better to
preserve the fruit. Oil of olives might be here plentifully extracted
were taxation fixed and moderate; but such has been the variation it
has undergone, that the culture of olives is so neglected as scarcely
to produce oil sufficient for domestic consumption.
Olive oil might form one of the most valuable articles of export from
Morocco. It is strong, dark, and fit only for manufacturing purposes.
This is, perhaps, not so much the fault of the olive as of the methods
by which it is prepared. No care is taken in collecting the olives.
They are beaten from the trees with poles, as in Portugal and Spain,
suffered to lie on the ground in heaps until half putrified, then put
into uncleaned presses, and the oil squeezed through the filthy
residuum of former years. Good table oil might be made, if care were
taken, as in France and Lucca, to pick the olives without bruising
them, and to press only those that were sweet and sound. But such oil
would ill suit the palate of a Maroqueen, accustomed to drink by the
pint and the quart the rancid product of his country.
The olive is the great staple of Corfu, which has, in fact, the
appearance of an extensive olive grove. It produces annually about
200,000 barrels. Olive oil is also produced for the purposes of
commerce, and for local consumption, by France, Algiers, Tuscany,
Spain, Sardinia, Portugal, Madeira, and South Australia.
Olive plantations are extending considerably both in Upper and Lower
Egypt. Large quantities of trees were planted under the direction of
Ibrahim Pasha.
The olive tree might be expected to be quickly matured at the Cape.
The native olive, resembling the European, is of spontaneous growth
and plentiful, so that if the Spanish or Italian tree were introduced,
there is no doubt of its success. The wood of the olive is exceedingly
hard and heavy, of a yellowish color, a close fine grain, capable of
the highest polish, not subject to crack nor to be affected by worms.
The root, in consequence of its variety of color, is much used for
snuff-boxes and similar bijouterie.
The wood is beautifully veined, and has an agreeable smell. It is in
great esteem with cabinet makers, on account of the fine polish of
which it is susceptible.
The sunny slopes of hills are best suited to its natural habits.
Layering is the most certain mode of propagating this fruit, although
it grows freely from the seed, provided it has first been steeped for
twelve hours in hot water or yeast.
Olives intended for preservation are gathered before they are ripe. In
pickling, the object is to remove their bitterness and preserve them
green, by impregnating them with a brine. For this purpose various
methods are employed. The fruit being gathered are placed in a lye,
composed of one part of quicklime to six of ashes of young wood
sifted. Here they remain for half a day, and are then put into fresh
water, being renewed every 24 hours; from this they are removed into a
brine of common salt dissolved in water, to which add some aromatic
plants. The olive will in this manner remain good for twelve months.
For oil, the ripe fruit is gathered in November; the oil, unlike other
plants, being obtained from the pericarp, and immediately bruised in a
mill, the stones of which are set so wide as not to crush the kernel.
The pulp is then subjected to the press in bags made of rushes; and,
by means of a gentle pressure, the best or virgin oil flows first. A
second, and afterwards a third quality of oil is obtained, by
moistening the residuum, breaking the kernel, &c., and increasing the
pressure. When the fruit is not sufficiently ripe, the recent oil has
a bitterish taste, and when too ripe it is fatty.
The following are the present market prices of olive oil in
Liverpool, (October, 1853,) and they are 40 per cent, higher than a
few years ago:--Galipoli, per tun of 252 gallons, £68; Spanish, £64;
Levant, £60. French olives, in half barrels of two gallons, are worth
£3 to £4; Spanish, in two gallon kegs, 9s. to 10s.
The preserved or pickled olives, so admired as an accompaniment to
wine, are, as we have seen the green unripe fruit, deprived of part of
their bitterness by soaking them in water, and then preserved in an
aromatised solution of salt.
The marc of olives after the oil has been expressed, indeed, the
refuse cake of all oil plants, is most valuable, either as manure or
for feeding cattle.
More than 29,000 acres are under culture with the olive in the
Austrian empire, Venice, Dalmatia, Lombardy, Carinthia, and Carniola.
The climate of Dalmatia is highly suitable for the olive, and the oil
is better than that produced in most parts of Italy. Nearly 17,000
cwt. are annually obtained.
In 1837 there were 11,526 acres of ground under cultivation with
olives in Southern Illyria, which yielded 261,800 gallons. Olives and
sumach form the principal crops of the landholder. I have not been
able to get any recent correct statistics of the culture and produce.
The oil of Istria is considered equal to that of Provence. The stones
and refuse are used there for fuel. The olive is also extensively
cultivated in the Quarnero Islands, especially Veglia and Cherso, and
in Corfu. There were in 1836, 219,339 acres under cultivation in the
Ionian Islands, producing 113,219 barrels. The olive is gathered there
in December. The average price of the barrel of olive oil was 48s. 3d.
Nearly two millions of gallons of olive oil were exported from Sicily
in 1842. Naples alone shipped five millions of gallons in 1839, and
about 2,500 cwts. of oil is shipped annually from Morocco. Russia
imports about 500,000 poods (40 lbs. each) of olive oil annually.
"Provence oil, the produce of Aix, is the most esteemed. Florence oil
is the virgin oil expressed from the ripe fruit soon after being
gathered; it is imported in flasks surrounded by a kind of network
formed by the leaves of a monocotyledonous plant, and packed in half
chests; it is that used at table under the name of salad oil. Lucca
oil is imported in jars holding nineteen gallons each. Genoa oil is
another fine kind. Galipoli oil forms the largest portion of the olive
oil brought to England, it is imported in casks. Apulia and Calabria
are the provinces of Naples most celebrated for its production; the
Apulian is the best. Sicily oil is of inferior quality; it is
principally produced at Milazzo. Spanish oil is the worst. The foot
deposited by olive oil is used for oiling machinery, under the name
of' droppings of sweet oil.'"--("Pereira's Materia Medica.")
The manufacture of olive oil in Spain has undergone very considerable
improvement during the last few years; in particular, the process for
expressing the oil has been rendered more rapid and effectual by the
introduction of the hydraulic press, and thus the injurious
consequences which resulted from the partial fermentation of the fruit
are avoided.
There are four different kinds of oil known in the districts where it
is prepared.
1. _Virgin oil_--A term which is applied, in the district Montpellier,
to that which spontaneously separates from the paste of crushed
olives. This oil is not met with in commerce, being all used by the
inhabitants, either as an emollient remedy, or for oiling the works of
watches. A good deal of virgin oil is, however, obtained from Aix.
2. _Ordinary oil_.--This oil is prepared by pressing the olives,
previously crushed and mixed with boiling water. By this second
expression, in which more pressure is applied than in the previous
one, an oil is obtained, somewhat inferior in quality to the virgin
oil.
3. _Oil of the infernal regions_.--The water which has been employed
in the preceding operation is in some districts conducted into large
reservoirs called the _infernal regions_, where it is left for many
days. During this period, any oil that might have remained mixed with
the water separates and collects on the surface. This oil being very
inferior in quality, is only fit for burning in lamps, and is
generally locally used.
4. _Fermented oil_ is obtained in the departments of Aix and
Montpellier, by leaving the fresh olives in heaps for some time, and
pouring boiling water over them before pressing the oil. But this
method is very seldom put in practice, for the olives during this
fermentation lose their peculiar flavor, become much heated, and
acquire a musty taste, which is communicated to the oil.
The fruity flavor of the oil depends upon the quality of the olives
from which it is pressed, and not upon the method adopted in its
preparation,"--(French "Journal de Pharmacie.")
The price of olive oil is sufficiently high to lead to its admixture
with cheaper oils. The oil of poppy seeds is that which is usually
employed for its adulteration, as it has the advantage of being cheap,
of having a sweet taste, and very little smell. M. Gobley has invented
an instrument which he calls an areometer, to detect this fraud. It is
founded on the difference between the densities of olive oil and oil
of poppies.
The imports, which in 1826 were only 742,719 gallons, had risen in
1850 to 5,237,816 gallons. The following figures show the progressive
imports and consumption:--
Imported. Retained for home consumption.
gallons. gallons.
1827 1,028,174 1,070,765
1831 4,158,917 1,928,892
1835 606,166 554,196
1839 1,793,920 1,806,178
1843 3,047,688 2,516,724
1847 2,190,384 --
1848 2,541,672 --
1849 4,274,928 --
1850 5,860,806 --
1851 2,898,756 2,749,572
1852 2,242,296 1,066,400
The imports of olive oil into the port of Liverpool were 9,815 tuns
in 1849, and 10,038 tuns in 1850. It was brought from Manila, Malaga,
and Corfu, but chiefly from Barbary, Palermo, Gallipoli, and the
Levant. In 1850 we imported from France 259,646 imperial gallons of
olive oil, officially valued at £34,638; the average in ordinary years
is only about 20,000 gallons from the continent.
ALMOND OIL.--To the south of the Empire of Morocco there are forests
of the Arzo tree, which is thorny, irregular in its form, and produces
a species of almond exceedingly hard. Its fruit consists of two
almonds, rough and bitter, from which an oil is produced, very
excellent for frying. In order to use this oil it requires to be
purified by fire, and set in a flame, which must be suffered to die
away of itself; the most greasy particles are thus consumed, and its
arid qualities wholly destroyed. "When the Moors gather these fruits
they drive their goats under the trees, and as the fruit falls the
animals carefully nibble off the skins, and then greedily feed.
The oil of almonds is more fluid than olive oil, and of a clear,
transparent, yellowish color, with a very slight odor and taste. It is
occasionally employed for making the finer kinds of soap, and also in
medicine.
In manufacturing it the fruit are first well rubbed or shaken in a
coarse bag or sack, to separate a bitter powder which covers their
epidermis. They are then pounded to a paste in mortars of marble,
which paste is afterwards subjected to the action of a press, as in
the case of the olive.
About 80 tuns of almond oil are annually imported into this country,
the price being about 1s. per pound. Five-and-a-half pounds of almond
oil will yield by cold expression one pound six ounces of oil, and
three-fourths of a pound more if the iron plates are heated.
SESAME OR TEEL.--Of this small annual plant there are two or three
species. _Sesamum orientale_, the common sort; and _S. indicum_, a
more robust kind, cultivated at a different season, are both natives
of the East Indies. _S. indicum_ bears a pale purple flower, and _S.
orientals_ has a white blossom. It is the latter which is chiefly
grown, and the seeds afford the Gingellie oil or suffed-til, already
extensively known in commerce in the East. The expressed oil is as
clear and sweet as that from almonds, and probably the Behens oil,
used in varnish, is no other. It is called by the Arabs "Siriteh," and
the seed, "bennie " seed, in Africa. _S. orientals_ is grown in the
West Indies under the name of "wangle." It is said to have been first
brought to Jamaica by the Jews as an article of food. 1,050 bags of
gingelly teel, or sesame seed, were imported into Liverpool, in 1849,
from the East, South America, and Africa, for expressing oil, and
3,700 bags in 1850. There are two kinds of seed, light and dark, and
it is about the same size as mustard seed, only not round.
A hectare of land in Algeria yields 1,475 kilogrammes of seed, which
estimated at 50 cents the kilogramme, amounts to 737 francs, whilst
the cost of production is only 259 francs, leaving a profit of 478
francs (nearly £20). The oil obtained from this seed is inferior to
good olive oil, but is better adapted for the manufacture of soap.
This plant is not unlike hemp, but the stalk is cleaner and
semi-transparent. The flower also is so gaudy, that a field in blossom
looks like a bed of florist's flowers, and its aromatic fragrance does
not aid to dispel such delusion. It flourishes most upon land which is
light and fertile. The fragrance of the oil is perceptibly weaker when
obtained from seed produced on wet, tenacious soils. A gallon of seed
seems to be the usual quantity sown upon an acre. In Bengal, _S.
orientale_ is sown during February, and the crop harvested at the end
of May; but _S. indicum_ is sown on high, dry soil, in the early part
of the rains of June, and the harvest occurs in September. About
Poonah it is sown in June and harvested in November. In Nepaul two
crops are obtained annually; one is sown as a first crop in April and
May, and reaped in October and November; the other as an autumn crop,
after the upland rise in August and September, and reaped in November
and December.
In Mysore, after being cut it is stacked for a week, then exposed to
the sun for three days, but gathered into heaps at night; and between
every two days of such drying, it is kept a day in the heap. By this
process, the pods burst and shed their seeds without thrashing.
The seeds contain an abundance of oil, which might be substituted for
olive oil; it is procured from them in great quantities, in Egypt,
India, Kashmir, China, and Japan, where it is used both for cooking
and burning. It will keep for many years and not acquire any rancid
smell or taste, but in the course of a year or two becomes quite mild,
so that when the warm taste of the seed, which is in the oil when
first expressed, is worn off, it is used for all the purposes of salad
oil. It possesses such qualities as fairly entitle it to introduction
into Europe; and if divested of its mucilage, it might perhaps compete
with oil of olives, at least for medicinal purposes, and could be
raised in any quantity in the British Indian Presidencies. It is
sufficiently free from smell to admit of being made the medium for
extracting the perfume of the jasmine, the tuberose, narcissus,
camomile, and of the yellow rose. The process is managed by adding one
weight of flowers to three weights of oil in a bottle, which being
corked is exposed to the rays of the sun for forty days, when the oil
is supposed to be sufliciently impregnated for use. This oil, under
the name of Gingilie oil, is used in India to adulterate oil of
almonds.
The flour of the seed, after the oil is expressed, is used in making
cakes, and the straw serves for fuel and manure.
The oil is much used in Mysore for dressing food, and as a common lamp
oil. From 200 to 400 quarters under the name of Niger seed are
imported annually into Liverpool for expressing oil.
Three varieties of Til are extensively cultivated throughout India,
for the sake of the fine oil expressed from their seeds, the white
seeded variety, the parti-colored, and the black. It is from the
latter that the sesamum or gingelly oil of commerce is obtained.
Sesamum seed contains about 45 per cent. of oil. Good samples of the
oil were shown at the Great Exhibition from Vizianagram, Ganjain,
Hyderabad, Tanjore, the district of Moorshedabad, and Gwalior. The
gingelly seed is stated to be worth about £4 per ton in the North
Circars.
An oil resembling that of sesamum is obtained from the seed of
_Guizotea oleifera_ and _Abyssinica_, a plant introduced from
Abyssinia, and common in Bengal. The ram til, or valisaloo seeds,
yield about 34 per cent, of oil. The oil is generally used for
burning, and is worth locally about 10d. per gallon.
BLACK TIL (_Verbesena sativa_).--This is known as kutsela or kala til,
in the Deccan. It is chiefly cultivated in Mysore and the western
districts of Peninsular India, as well as in the Bombay presidency.
About Seringapatam, as soon as the millet crop has been reaped the
field is ploughed four times, and the seed sown, a gallon per acre,
during the month of July or August, after the first heavy rain. No
manure or weeding is required, for the crop will grow on the worst
soils. It is reaped in three months, being cut close to the ground,
and stacked for a week. After exposure to the sun for two or three
days, the seed is beaten out with a stick. The crop in Mysore rarely
yields two bushels per acre, but about Poonah the produce is much
larger. The seed is sometimes parched and made into sweetmeats, but is
usually grown for its oil. This is used in cooking, but it is not so
abundant in the seed, nor so good as that of the sesame. Bullocks will
not eat the stems unless pressed by hunger.
About 5,000 maunds are exported annually from Calcutta. 3,703 bags
were imported into Liverpool in 1851. The price per quarter of eight
bushels, in January, 1853, was from 30s. to £2; of teel oil, in tins,
weighing 60 to 100 pounds, £2 to £2 4s.
Bombay linseed was worth £2 11s. to £2 12s. the quarter of eight
bushels, in January, 1853. Bengal ditto 2s. less. The imports into
Liverpool were 68,468 bags and 54,834 pockets in 1851, and 14,490 bags
and 33,700 pockets in 1852. About 9,000 bags of mustard seed and from
18,000 to 20,000 bags of rape seed are also imported thence. The price
of the latter is about £2 the quarter.
NATIVE OIL MILLS.--The principal native oil mill of India, of which,
however, there are some varieties, consists of a simple wooden mortar
with revolving pestle. It is in common use in all Belgaum and
Bangalore. Two oxen are harnessed to the geering, which depends from
the extremity of the pestle,--a man sits on the top of the mortar, and
throws in the seeds that may have got displaced. The mill grinds twice
a day; a fresh man and team being employed on each occasion. When
sesame oil is to be made, about seventy seers measure, or two and a
half bushels of seeds are thrown in; to this ten seers, or two quarts
and three-quarters of water, are gradually added; this on the
continuance of the grinding, which lasts in all six hours, unites with
the fibrous portion of the seeds, and forms a cake, which, when
removed, leaves the oil clean and pure at the bottom of the mortar.
From this it is taken out by a coco-nut shell cup, on the pestle being
withdrawn. Other seed oils are described by Dr. Buchanan, as made
almost entirely in the same way as the sesamum. The exceptions are the
hamlu, or castor oil, obtained from either the small or large
varieties of _Ricinus_. This, at Seringapatam, is first parched in
pots, containing something more than a seer each. It is then beaten in
a mortar, and formed into balls; of these from four to sixteen seers
are put in an earthenware pot and boiled with an equal quantity of
water, for the space of five hours; frequent care being taken to stir
the mixture to prevent it from burning. The oil now floats on the
surface, and is skimmed off pure. The oil mill made use of at Bombay,
and to the northward, at Surat, Cambay, Kurrachee, &c., differs a
little from that just described, in having a very strong wooden frame
round the mouth of the mortar; on this the man who keeps the seeds in
order sits. In Scinde a camel is employed to drive the mill instead of
bullocks.
Castor oil seed is thrown into the mill like other seeds, as already
described; when removed it requires to be boiled for an hour, and then
strained through a cloth to free it from the fragments of the seed.
It is a curious fact, and illustrative of the imperfect manner in
which the oil is separated from the seeds, that while the common
pressman only obtained some 26¼ per cent., Boussingault, in his
laboratory, from the same seeds, actually procured 41 per cent. When
the oil cakes are meant for feeding stock, this loss is of little
consequence, inasmuch as the oil serves a very good purpose, but when
the cake is only intended to be used as a manure, it is a great loss,
inasmuch as the oil is of little or no use in adding any food for
crops to the soil.
The chief oil made on the sea board of India, is that yielded by the
coco-nut palm. The nut having been stripped of the husk or coir, the
shell is broken, and the fatty lining enclosing the milk is taken out.
This is called cobri, copra, or copperah in different localities.
Three maunds, or ninety pounds of copperah, are thrown into the mill
with about three gallons of water, and from this is produced three
maunds, or seven and three-quarter gallons of oil. The copperah in its
unprepared state is sold, slightly dried in the market. It is burned
in iron cribs or grates, on the top of poles as torches, in
processions, and as means of illumination for work performed in the
open air at night. No press or other contrivance is made use of by the
natives in India for squeezing out or expressing the oil from the
cake, and a large amount of waste, in consequence of this, necessarily
ensues.--_Bombay Times_, June 5, 1850.
Oil, of the finest kind, is made in India by expression from the
kernels of the apricot. It is clear, of a pale yellow color, and
smells strongly of hydrocyanic acid, of which it contains, usually,
about 4 per cent.
"On inquiring into the use made of the sunflower, we were given to
understand that it is here (in Tartary) raised chiefly for the oil
expressed from it. But it is also of use for many other purposes. In
the market places of the larger towns we often found the people eating
the seeds, which, when boiled in water, taste not unlike the boiled
Indian corn eaten by the Turks. In some districts of Russia the seeds
are employed with great success in fattening poultry; they are also
said to increase the number of eggs more than any other kind of grain.
Pheasants and partridges eat them with great avidity, and find the
same effects from them as other birds. The dried leaves are given to
cattle in place of straw; and the withered stalks are said to produce
a considerable quantity of alkali."--_Bremner's Interior of Russia._
658 barrels linseed oil were brought down to New Orleans from the
interior in 1849, and 1009 in 1848.
During the period of the Great Exhibition special enquiry was made by
many manufacturers as to the different oils of Southern India,
suitable for supplying the place of animal fat in the manufacture of
candles, and generally adapted for various other purposes. Enquiries
should be directed to the specific gravity, the boiling point, the per
centage of pure oil in the seeds, and the means of obtaining a regular
supply. The demand for vegetable oils in European commerce has been
steadily on the increase for several years past, and the quantities
consumed are now so large that the oleaginous products of India and
the colonies must sooner or later have a considerable commercial
importance, from the value which they are likely to acquire. Indeed
some have already established a footing in the home market, and Drs.
Hunter, Cleghorn, and others in India, have specially directed the
attention of the natives and merchants to the subject.
MARGOSE, OR NEEM OIL.--From the pericarp or fleshy part of the fruit
of the _Melia Azederachta_, the well known Margosa oil is prepared;
which is cheap and easily procurable in Ceylon. Dr. Maxwell, garrison
surgeon of Trichinopoly, states that he has found this oil equally
efficacious to cod-liver oil in cases of consumption and scrofula. He
began with half-ounce doses, morning and evening, which were gradually
reduced.
ILLEPE OIL.--The seeds of three species of Bassia, indigenous to
India, yield solid oils, and are remarkable for the fact, that they
supply at the same time saccharine matter, spirit, and oil, fit for
both food and burning in lamps. The Illepe( _B. longifolia_) is a tree
abundant in the Madras Presidency, the southern parts of Hindostan
generally, and the northern province of Ceylon. In Ceylon the
inhabitants use the oil in cooking and for lamps. The oil cake is
rubbed on the body as soap, and seems admirably adapted for removing
the unctuosity of the skin caused by excessive perspiration, and for
rendering it soft, pliable, and glossy, which is so conducive to
health in a tropical climate. The oil is white and solid at common
temperatures, fusing at from 70 to 80 degrees. It may be
advantageously employed in the manufacture of both candles and soap;
in Ceylon and some parts of India this oil forms the chief ingredient
in the manufacture of soap.
Mahower (_B. latifolia_) is common in most parts of the Bengal
Presidency. The oil a good deal resembles that last described,
obtained from the Illepe seeds; and may be used for similar purposes.
It is solid at common temperatures, and begins to melt at about 70
degrees.
Vegetable butter is obtained from the Choorie (_B. butyracea_). This
tree, though far less generally abundant than the other two species,
is common in certain of the hilly districts, especially in the eastern
parts of Kumaon; in the province of Dotee it is so abundant that the
oil is cheaper than ghee, or fluid butter, and is used to adulterate
it. It is likewise commonly burnt in lamps, for which purpose it is
preferred to coco-nut oil. It is a white solid fat, fusible at about
120 degrees, and exhibits very little tendency to become rancid when
kept.
Shea, or galam butter, is obtained in Western Africa from the _Bassia
Parkii_, or _Pentadisma butyracea_, a tree closely resembling the _B.
latifolia_, and other species indigenous to Hindostan. According to
Park, the tree is abundant in Bambara, the oil is solid, of a
greyish-white color, and fuses at 97 degrees. Its product is used for
a variety of purposes--for cooking, burning in lamps, &c.
This tree has much of the character of the laurel, but grows to the
height of eighteen or twenty feet. Its leaf is somewhat longer than
the laurel, and is a little broader at the point; the edges of the
leaf are gently curved, and are of a dark sap green color. The nut is
of the form and size of a pigeon's egg, and the kernel completely
fills the shell. When fresh it is of a white drab color, but, if long
kept, becomes the color of chocolate. The kernel, when new, is nearly
all butter, which is extracted in the following manner:--The shell is
removed from the kernel, which is also crushed, and then a quantity is
put into an earthen pot or pan, placed over the fire with a portion of
water and the nut kernels. After boiling slowly about half an hour the
whole is strained through a grass mat into a clean vessel, when it is
allowed to cool. Then, after removing the fibrous part from it, it is
put into a grass bag and pressed so as to obtain all the oil. This is
poured into the vessel along with the first-mentioned portion, and
when cold is about the consistence of butter.
The nuts hang in bunches from the different boughs, but each nut has
its own fibre, about seven or eight inches long, and about the
thickness and color of whip-cord. The nut is attached to the fibre in
a very singular manner. The end of the fibre is concealed by a thin
membrane, about half an inch wide and three-quarters of an inch long.
This membrane is attached to the side of the nut, and, when ripe,
relinquishes its hold, and the nut falls to the ground, when it is
gathered for use. A good-sized healthy tree yields about a bushel of
nuts, but the greater number are not so prolific. The trees close to
the stream present a more healthy appearance, probably on account of
being better watered, and the fire being less powerful close to the
stream.
THE CANDLE NUT TREE (_Aleurites triloba_, of Foster) grows in the
Polynesian Islands, and is also met with in some parts of Jamaica and
the East Indies. In the latter quarter it is known as the Indian
Akhrowt. A very superior kind of paint oil is produced from the nut,
and the cake, after the expression of the oil, forms an excellent food
for cattle, and a useful manure. 31½ gallons of the nut yield ten
gallons of oil, which bears a good price in the home markets.
The yearly produce of this oil in the Sandwich Isles, where it is
called kukui oil, is about 10,000 gallons. It has been shipped to the
markets of Chili, New South Wales, and London, but not as yet with
much profit. It realized about £20 per imperial ton in the port of
London. In 1843, about 8,620 gallons were shipped from Honolulu,
valued at 1s. 8d. per gallon.
In Ceylon the oil is known as kekune oil, and a good deal of it might
be obtained there from the district of Badulla. From the trials made
it appears that it cannot be used as a drying oil, but will probably
answer best as a substitute for rape oil. Samples have been sent to
several clothiers, and the nature and quality of the oil renders it
most applicable to their purposes.
COLZA (_Brassica oleracea_), a variety of the common cabbage, is much
grown in the South of Europe and other parts, for the oil obtained by
pressure from its seeds, and which is used for lamps and other
purposes. The plant will not thrive on sand or clay, but requires a
rich light soil. After the ground has been well ploughed and manured,
the seed should be sown in July, in furrows eight or ten inches
asunder. The plants are transplanted about October. When ripe the
stalks are reaped with a sickle, and the seeds threshed out with a
flail. The cake, after the oil is expressed, is an excellent food for
cattle.
Like all the oleaginous plants cultivated for their seed, colza
greatly impoverishes the soil.
In Peru the caoutchouc is used as a substitute for candles. A roll of
it (which is generally about a yard long and three inches in diameter)
is cut lengthways into four parts, but before it is lighted the piece
is rolled up in a green plantain leaf, to prevent it from melting or
taking fire down the sides. The natives of Peru also bruize the beans
of a species of wild cacao after they have been well dried, and use
the substance instead of tallow in their lamps.
Mr. Dearman, writing from Dacca, to Dr. Spry, Secretary to the
Agricultural and Horticultural Societies of India, in 1839, says--"I
will send you some seeds from a tree, which resemble chestnuts. One of
these seeds, after taking off the shell, being stuck on the point of
a penknife, and lighted at a candle flame, will burn without the least
odor for four or five minutes, giving a light equal to two or three
candles. From the flower of the tree (he adds), I am told, is
distilled a delightful scent." [I presume this must be the candle-nut
tree.]
At the Feejee and Hawaian islands, the seeds of the castor oil plant
and of the candle-nut tree (_Aleurites triloba_) are strung together
and used for candles. Species of torches are also made from the candle
wood in Demerara.
THE CANDLEBERRY MYRTLE (_Myrica cerifera_) abounds in the Bahama
Islands. The shrub produces a small green berry, which, like the hog
plum, puts out from the trunk and larger limbs. Much patient labor is
required in gathering these berries, and from them is obtained a
beautiful green wax, which burns very nearly, if not fully, as well as
the spermaceti, or composition candles imported from abroad. Not long
since Mr. Thos. B. Musgrove, of St. Salvador (or Cat Island), obtained
about 80 lbs. of this wax, and made some excellent candles of it. The
method of procuring this wax is by boiling the berries in a copper or
brass vessel for some time. Iron pots are found to darken and cloud
the wax. The vessel after a sufficient time is taken from the fire,
and when cool the hardened wax, floating on the top of the water, is
skimmed off.
MYRTLE WAX.--According to the experiments of M. Cadet and Dr. Bostock,
myrtle wax differs in many respects from bees' wax, Specimens of it
assume shades of a yellowish green color. Its smell is also different;
myrtle wax, when fresh, emitting a fragrant balsamic odor. It has in
part the unctuosity of bees' wax, and somewhat of the brittleness of
resin. Its specific gravity is greater, insomuch that it sinks in
water, whereas bees' wax floats upon it; and it is not so easily
bleached to form white wax. The wax tree of Louisiana contains immense
quantities of wax.
Mr. Moodie ("Ten Tears in South Africa") says,--
"I occasionally employed my people, at spare times, in gathering wax
berries that grow in great abundance upon small bushes in the sand
hills, near the sea, and yield a substance partaking of the nature
of wax and tallow, which is mixed with common tallow, and used by
the colonists for making candles. The berry is about the size of a
pea, and covered with a bluish powder. They are gathered by
spreading a skin on the sand, and beating the bush with a stick.
When a sufficient quantity of the berries are collected, they are
boiled in a great quantity of water, and the wax is skimmed off as
fast as it rises; the wax is then poured into flat vessels and
allowed to cool, when it becomes hard and brittle, and has a
metallic sound when struck. The cakes thus formed are of a deep
green color, and are sold at the same price as tallow. The wild pigs
devour these berries when they come in their way, and seem very fond
of them."
A good specimen of myrtle, or candleberry wax, accompanied by candles
made from it in the crude unbleached state in New Brunswick, was shown
at the Great Exhibition.
Vegetable wax was also sent from Shanghae, in China; from St. Domingo,
in the northern parts of which the plant is indigenous; and a
remarkable specimen from Japan. This substance, from its high melting
point and other physical characteristics, has of late attracted a good
deal of attention; it is admirably suited as a material for the
manufacture of candles.
At a meeting of the Central Board, at Cape Town, in March, 1853, the
members voted about £300, to employ some 20 or 30 men, in gathering
berries from the Downs, and making wax during the winter months, that
is, from the beginning of May to the end of September. The wax fetches
a good price in the Cape market.
In the annual report of the Cape of Good Hope Agricultural Society,
in May, 1853, a very fine sample of myrtle, or terry wax, grown on
the Cape Flats, was exhibited by Mr. Feeny, Superintendent of the
Road Plantation, by direction of the Commissioners of the Central
Road Board, in different stages of purification, from green to
white, as also some candles; and it being conceived by the meeting
that this article might ultimately become one of considerable
importance for purposes of export, a letter of thanks was addressed
to Mr. Feeny; and Nathaniel Day, the constable who assisted him, was
presented with the sum of £5, as a remuneration for his trouble in
assisting to purify and prepare the wax. On reference to the juror's
report on the Great Exhibition, it will be gratifying to find that
the berry wax, forwarded by this Society, had attracted peculiar
notice, and a prize medal been awarded for it; the following
reference is therein made to it: "some fine specimens of myrtle or
berry wax, from the Cape of Good Hope, are exhibited by J.
Lindenberg, of Worcester. This is an excellent material for the
manufacture of candles, when employed in conjunction with other
solid fats. The jury awarded a prize medal for these specimens."
Your Committee would suggest every possible attention being drawn to
this subject, in which they are gratified to state, the
Commissioners of the Central Road Board have evinced a readiness to
co-operate, by offering to place at the Society's disposal the sum
of £10 10s., "to be given as a premium for the best information
respecting the wax berry plant, the soils and situations in which it
is found to grow most luxuriantly: the best mode of propagating and
cultivating it, of collecting the berries, and extracting and
preparing the wax, &c." And from a letter received from the
Secretary to the Central Road Board, it appears that the Board had
authorised the shipment to England of 2,561 lbs. of the wax, by the
_Queen of the South_ in November last, which, from the account sales
lately received from Messrs. J.R. Thomson & Co., realised as
follows, viz.:--
4 cases weighing nett 856 lbs. à 8d. £28 10 8
4 " 1040 lbs. à 9d. 39 0 0
3 " 745 lbs. à 11d. 34 2 11
3 " 6 lbs. à 11d. 0 5 6
---------------
£101 19 1
Discount 2½ per cent. 2 11 0
---------------
£99 8 1
CHARGES.
Warehouse Entry 3s. 6d. Fire Insurance
2s., Ports 2s. 6d £0 8 0
Freight 7 3 3
Primage 0 14 4
Dock Charges 3 9 6
Sale Expenses 0 9 0
Brokerage 1 0 6
---------------
£13 4 7
Commission at 2½ per cent 2 11 0
---------------
Carried forward £16 15 7
Brought forward £15 15 7
---------
£83 12 6
Deduct Bills of Lading, &c. 0 19 6
---------
£82 13 0
Deduct the Board's expenses for gathering and
preparing, &c 28 8 7
---------
Leaving a clear profit of £54 4 5
This statement shows that from a plant, which is indigenous to the
colony, and might he cultivated to almost any extent, and mostly on
soils unavailable for other purposes, an article of great export
could be derived at a comparatively small expense; it is with that
view that I desire to direct public attention more prominently to
it.
In the Museum of the Royal Botanic Gardens, at Kew, wax is shown as
scraped from the trunk of the wax palm (_Ceroxylon andicola_), and
candles made from it, as also some made of acorns and closely
resembling common tallow. Concrete milk and butter made from the Shea
butter tree, and others growing in Para, are also exhibited.
Wax candles have been made from the seeds of _Myrica macrocarpa_ in
Colombia, and also from vegetable wax in Java. Some of these are to be
seen in the Museum of the Pharmaceutical Society of London.
CASTOR OIL PLANT.
Castor oil is expressed from the seeds of _Ricinus communis (Palma
Christi)_, a plant with petale-palmate leaves, which is found native
in Greece, Africa, the South of Spain, and the East Indies, and is
cultivated in the West Indies, as well as in North and South America.
In the temperate and northern parts of Europe, the plant is an
herbaceous annual, of from three to eight feet high; in the more
southern parts it becomes scrubby and even attains an height of twenty
feet; while in India it is often a tree thirty to forty feet high. The
best oil is obtained by expression from the seeds without heat, and is
hence called "cold drawn oil." A large quantity of oil may be produced
by boiling the seeds, but it is less sweet and more apt to become
rancid than that procured by expression.
The _Palma Christi_ grows continuously for about four years, and
becomes a large tree in constant bearing, ripening its rich clusters
of beans in such profusion, that 100 bushels may be obtained annually
from an acre, and their product of oil two gallons per bushel.