A tree to 18 m high, short bole, bushy spreading crown, of the evergreen forest often in damp situations, or of dry forest understorey from Guinea to S Nigeria.The sap-wood is whitish, turning to yellow in the air; heart-wood is pinkish to deep yellow or olive-brown at the centre. The wood is hard, heavy, fine-grained and takes a good polish. It is suitable for carpentry and general construction-work though liable to fungal attack. It is resistant to teredo worm and so is used for wharves and bridges. (1, 3, 4, 9.) In Sierra Leone it furnishes a pole-crop from forest reserves (7).The roots particularly, but sometimes the twigs, are used as chew-sticks. They are commonly cut up into pencil-lengths and traded in markets in Sierra Leone (5, 7–10), Ivory Coast (1, 2) and Ghana (3, 6, 11). Use of them is held to strengthen the gums and to prevent dental caries. Phytochemical tests have shown the presence of a high amount of flavonic substances in the chew-sticks and of tannins and flavones in root- and stem-barks (2), also of gamboge which is haemostatic, antiseptic and vulnerary (11). Raphia wine in which root-bark has been soaked is drunk in Sierra Leone as an aphrodisiac, and the seeds are acknowledged to be highly erogenic so that they ‘should not be eaten when brother and sister are left alone’ (9). Bark is chewed in Sierra Leone for cough and stomach-ache, or a decoction of it is taken (5).The fruits are brownish-yellow, to 2 .5 cm in diameter and contain 2–4 seeds embedded in an acidulous pulp which is edible and much relished.