THE ISLAND OF CEYLON. 
32/2 
form among the rigging of a ship, and was scarcely 
outdone even by the monkeys, the native inhabitants of 
these groves. 
The trees from which the toddy is extracted, being de- 
prived of so much of their juice, produce fruit of a very 
inferior quality, and much sooner fall into decay. 
When we consider the innumerable comforts which this 
tree affords to the natives of India, it is not to be won- 
dered that they hold it in the highest esteem, and reckon it 
a most important part of their wealth. When a child is 
born, it is customary for them to plant a cocoa-tree in me- 
morial of the happy event ; and the rings which are left 
around the trunk by its animal vegetation, serve to mark the 
number of the recurring birth-days. 
Another tree, bearing a fruit as generally used, though by 
no means equal in utility to that of the cocoa, is the betel- 
tree. I have already mentioned how universally the areka or 
betel nut is chewed by the natives of India. The leaf 
usually distinguished by the name of the betel-leaf does not, 
however, grow upon this tree, but from being constantly 
chewed along with the betel nut, has acquired this appella- 
tion. The tree, though remarkably tall and straight, is 
equally remarkable for' its extreme slenderness, being no 
thicker than the calf of a man’s leg, The nuts grow in 
bunches at the top like those of the cocoa, but are in size no 
bigger than a nutmeg, and with the same sort of shell. 
After they are pulled, the Cinglese expose them in the sun 
