BETEL CHEWING. 95 



duced from the West. In the Louisiade Archipelago and in Soutli- 

 East New Guinea, tobacco was unknown until the last few years.^ 



The practice of chewing the betel-nut is prevalent through the 

 group, and is accompanied by the usual accessories, the lime and the 

 betel-pepper {Piper Betel). In St. Christoval and the neighbouring 

 small islands, the lime is carried in bamboo boxes, which ai'e 

 decorated with patterns scratched on their surface. In the islands 

 of Bougainville Straits, gourds are employed for this purpose, the 

 stoppers of which are ingeniously made of narrow bands of the leaf 

 of the sago palm wound round and round in the form of a disc and 

 bound together at the margin by fine strips of the vascular tissue of 

 the " sinimi " fern (Gleichenia sp.). Plain wooden sticks, like a 

 Chinese chop-stick, are used for conveying the lime to the mouth : 

 but frequently the stick is dispensed with, when the fingers are used 

 or the betel-nut is dipped into the lime. 



The Piper Betel, w^hich is known in Bougainville Straits as the 

 " kolu," is grown in the plantations, where it is trailed around the 

 stems of bananas and the trunks of trees. In these straits, as on the 

 Maclay Coast of New Guinea,^ the female spike, or so-called fruit, is 

 more usually chewed with the betel-nut. Around St. Christoval the 

 leaves are generally preferred. 



The betel palm, the " olega " of the natives, which is apparently 

 identical with, or closely allied to, Areca catechu, the common betel- 

 nut tree, is grown in clumps and groves in the vicinity of villages. 

 The fruits of other species of Ao^eca, which grow wild, are occa- 

 sionally used as substitutes for the ordinary betel-nut ; in Bougain- 

 ville Straits the fruits of the " niga-solu," " niga-torulo," and " poa- 

 mau " are thus employed, those of the " poamau " being appropriated 

 by the women. 



Betel-chewing is practised by both sexes. It has a marked 

 stimulant effect ; but the natives allege that no harm results from its 

 constant use. The betel-pepper gives the betel-juice the " bite " of 

 a o-lass of groor ; by the natives it is considered to remove the taint 



1 Miklouho-Maclay in Proc. Lin. Soc, N. S. "W., vol. X., p. 352. 



Crawfurd makes some interesting remarks on the introduction of tobacco into the Malay 

 Archipelago, whence, as I have shown above, the plant has been evidently introduced into 

 the Western Pacific. The Java annals affirm that tobacco was introduced in 1691 ; and, as 

 supporting this statement, Crawfurd observes that the plant is not mentioned by European 

 travellers in this region before the beginning of the 17th century. (Malay Grammar and 

 Dictionary, vol. I., p. 191.) 



- Miklouho-Maclay : Proc. Lin. Soc, N. S. "W., vol. X., p. 3.j0. 



