486 A TROPICAL DEPENDENCY lain hidden in the mineral beds of Australia, California, and the Transvaal. Rubber, shea butter, palm oil, wood oil, gums, and many other articles of modern trade, exist in the forests in quantities which represent an almost limitless addition to the circulating wealth of the world — if labour can be found to harvest them, and transport facilities can be given to carry them to the markets of civilisation. That these sylvan products require enterprise for their development, and for the conversion of their potential resources into realised wealth, is all the better. They offer a fresh field to the activity of new generations.

In Northern Nigeria an important forest belt spreads across the southern states and up the valleys of the principal rivers.

In Ilorin and Kabba, the two most westerly provinces south of the Niger, the forests contain much valuable timber, in which mahogany is especially noticeable. There are also in these provinces extensive plantations of kola trees, bearing the nut most valued in the markets of the Protectorate. In Ilorin there is little rubber, but in Kabba there is a great deal, Funtumia elastica and several Landolphias being common. The forests are known also to contain many commercial products which further exploration would bring to light. Bassa, on the southern side of the Benu6, is practically a rubber reserve. Here there exist stretches of what may be called " rubber forest," in which thick masses of Landolphia vines scramble over the trees. Nassarawa, both north and south of the Benu6, contains great quantities of rubber. On the banks of the Lower Benue, and also on the banks of the Gurara River, flowing through the western part of Nassarawa into the Niger, there are splendid forest areas, in which mahogany and ebony predominate. These woods, being situated on the banks of navigable rivers, could be easily worked. The same observation applies to the rubber forests of Bassa, a province which occupies the angle formed by the meeting