A USEFUL GUN. 
69 
are under the impression that they have only to recline 
upon it for a few moments, invoke the assistance of its 
powerful influence, stick their offerings in the ground at 
its rear, and then return home with an almost certainty 
of their prayers being answered, ‘The Dutchman said 
that that gun had been there ever since the English had 
given up the colony,’ continued Bliss, ‘ and that there is 
no telling how much longer it will remain. See there, 
the flowers and fruit and pieces of gilded paper lying 
around the breech!’ ” 
I had taken a chew of “betel-nut,” and, having never 
heard of the fruit before, inquired concerning it, and 
wrote in my journal as follows: — 
“ The betel-nut is used by the natives of both sexes, 
very much as we use cavendish, — the only difference 
being that they swallow much of the saliva. It is a sti- 
mulant, and is said to impart strength when weak fi’om 
hunger, without any unpleasant reaction. It grows upon 
a tall, shaft-like tree, which often attains a height of from 
one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet. It is per- 
fectly free from branches, knots, or even great irregulari- 
ties of the bark. It is a single shaft from the ground 
until within a few feet of the top, when a few branches 
shoot out and produce the nut. One of them might be 
taken by a stranger for a very tall and straight cocoanut- 
tree. The preparation which they chew, and which is 
generally supposed to be simply a piece of the nut, is 
composed of equal parts of lime, the leaf, and the nut. 
It has an acrid, burning taste at first, and is flir from 
unpleasant. The burning sensation proceeds from the 
leaf. 
