38 Remarks on the Sequel to the [Jan. 



dentlj of this being opposed to the text, it is difficult to comprehend 

 why betel-leaf and areca nut should be carried to so great a distance for 

 the mere purpose of being made into balls, and afterwards brought back 

 to India under the name of Malabathrum, as is there mentioned. Wil- 

 ford gives a very different interpretation of this passage of the Sequel. He 

 supposes that Malabathrum is a kind of tea, which is prepared in the 

 form of balls, and sold at some of the frontier towns of Ava, Assam, and 

 Laos. lie considers the Sesatse as identical with a gipsey tribe called 

 Besadse, who are hucksters by trade, and who, in this capacity, frequent 

 the different fairs throughout the country. The Besatae, he supposes, 

 made small baskets of certain leaves as large as those of the vine, which 

 they sewed together with the fibres of the bamboo : and then filled with 

 leaves of a certain plant rolled into balls, which were of three sorts ac- 

 cording to the quality and size of the leaves. The Petros of the text, 

 he supposes to be the leaf of the Dhac tree (Butea frondosa) which is 

 used all over India to make baskets, and which are fastened with skewers 

 from the fibres of the bamboo. According to this interpretation, mala- 

 bathrum or tea, was sold by the Tkinae or Chinese to the Sesatse or 

 Besatae, who brought it into India for sale. But the reverse of this is 

 stated in the text, viz., that the Sesatse brought the article of which 

 Malabathrum was formed from the interior of their country, and sold it 

 to the Things, who made it into balls which they (the Thinae) conveyed 

 into India. 



Petros and Malabathrum consisted neither of betel nor tea, but of dif- 

 ferent parts of the trees yielding Tejpatra and Cassia Lignea. The former 

 is the bark, and the latter are the leaves of one or more species of trees of 

 the genus Cinnamomum. That Malabathrum is identical with Cinna- 

 momum albiflorum is established by the fact, that Saduj is the name 

 which is given to Malabathrum in the writings of the Arabs, while Saduj 

 is applied in Persian works to Tejapatra or Tejpata, which is the Cinna- 

 momum of Botanists. " Malatroon," says Boyle, " is assigned as the 

 Greek name in Persian Materia Medica." Cinnamomum albiflorum is 

 also designated Tuj and Patruj* in Hindoostan — the former name being 

 generally applied to the leaf, and the latter to the bark of the tree. Tuj, 

 Tejpata, or Tejapatra, by all of which names this leaf is known, is used as 



* Royle's Illustrations of Botany of the Himalayan Mountains, p. 325. Dr. But- 

 ter's Tonography of Oude, p. 43. 



