Baobab

ba'o-bab, a tropical tree of western and southern Africa. A baobab tree in its glory forms a low, broad, hemispherical mass of green, perhaps sixty feet high and one hundred and fifty feet in diameter. The trunk of such a tree is thirty feet in diameter, half as thick as it is high. It has been called the largest known tree, but must yield this honor to the eucalyptus, or to giant trees of California. Large white flowers hang in drooping clusters a yard long. The fruit, called monkey's bread, supports a crowd of these animals. It is useful to travelers to quench thirst and ward off pestilential fevers. Livingstone speaks of this tree in his South African travels.