Palm Trees Cultivated. Camwood. Ivory
All through the Yoruba country the palm tree is cultivated, being regularly trimmed and pruned, and never cut down in clearing a farm, except when from age the tree has ceased to bear, or is of the male species, when it is cut down for the wine, which is the sap, extracted from the trunk, in a horizontal position, by boring a hole near the top and catching it in a vessel, when it is drunk either before, during, or after fermentation.
Camwood is also very plentiful, but owing to its great weight and the inconvenience at present of transportation, it does not enter extensively into the commerce of these parts, except as dyestuffs in the native markets. Gum elastic or India rubber is plentiful.
Ivory enters largely into commerce, being brought by "middle men" from the distant interior.
Indian Corn or Maize, Peas, Beans, Ginger, Pepper, Arrowroot, &c
Indian corn, the finest in the world (usually white), is here raised in the greatest quantities, we having frequently passed through hundreds of acres in unbroken tracts of cultivated land, which is beginning to enter into foreign commerce; Guinea corn in great abundance—an excellent article for horses, spoken of in another place; also peas, such as are raised for horse and cattle feed in Canada and other parts of America; white beans in great quantities, as well as those of all colors; black-eye peas; horse beans; in fact, all of the pulse vegetables; also ginger, arrowroot, red pepper in pods (the cayenne of commerce), and black pepper, all of which are articles of commerce; indigo; they also produce salt, and pea-nuts.