524 PALM^. 



Bretsclineider states {Chinese UecorJer, 1871), on tte authority 

 of the Nang Fang Tsao mil chang, a work written in the 4th 

 century, that the word is derived from Pin "a guest/' in 

 allusion to the custom of presenting the nuts to guests which had 

 teen introduced into China from India. 



Early Arabian writers mention the Fdfal as the fruit of a 



palm, not of Arabia, hard as though it were wood. 

 Their physicians describe it as good for hot and gross humors 

 prepared as a liniment ; and for inflammation of the eyes as a 

 collyrium; and of great efficacy for drying up the seminal 

 fluid, and as a digestive. Fdfal is a corruption of the Persian 

 Pupal, a word probably cognate with the Sanskrit Kuvara 



certain 



be derived from the Hind 



f^^ 



Though the betel-nut must have been known to the Greeks 

 who visited India, it does not appear to have been noticed by 

 any of their historians or medical writers ; Desfontaines, how- 

 ever, suggests that it may have been the Hestiatoris or 

 Protohudia of Pliny (24, 102), so called from its promotion of 

 gaiety and good fellowship at carousals. 



Hindu medical writers describe the unripe nuts as laxative 

 and carminative, the fresh nuts as intoxicating and productive 

 of giddiness ; when dried, they are said to sweeten the breath, 

 strengthen the gums, remove bad tastes from the mouth, and 

 produce a stimulant or exhilarant eflcect on the system. Their 

 use IS recommended in urinary disorders and as an aphrodisiac ; 

 lor the latter purpose a confection is made by boiling the nuts 

 m milk and adding a number of aromatic and stimulant 



Datura 



Kam 



modahi. Unripe betel-nuts which have been boiled are known 

 as red betel, or chihnt supar't, and an extract which is obtained 

 Irom the water in which they have been boiled is oft^n given 



confinement as 



with powdered red betel 



stimulant. In Western 



preparation is known as snp^ri che pUl. The fact that the use 

 of Iresh betel-nuts gives rise to a sensation of strangling and 



