806 
" The pituri, when ready for use, resembles a coarse grass chaff, and is carried in bags containing 
about a bushel bags neatly woven from strings of human hair or vegetable fibre, that arc carried by a 
shoulder strap after the manner of a schoolboy's satchel, the only difference being that the pituri bag is 
carried close up under the arm. Making this bag is a work of many months. The pituri is chewed similar 
to tobacco, but the ' quid ' is larger. No. 1 chews it awhile, discharging the result meantime at vagrant 
flies, through crevices left by lost milk-teeth (invariably he is a dead shot at short range) ; then he passes 
it on to No. 2, and so on, the round of the party, and then the quid is carefully stowed behind the ear 
until further stimulant is required. Occasionally, when in short supply, the quid is flavoured and made 
to spin out by dipping in the ashes of gidya leaves at intervals of the chewing; and for the present let it 
rest there." 
The following notes are by Dr. Roth, a former protector of the North Queensland 
aborigines (see his Bulletin No. 3 of North Queensland Ethnography) : 
" The principal indigenous narcotic is pituri, which, if all is well, arrives iu the Boulia district, in the 
rough, about the beginning of March. By ' in the rough ' is meant the condition very much like half- 
green, half-yellow tea with plenty of chips in which it is conveyed in special dilly-bags for barter; the 
construction of these particular bags has been described in Bulletin No. 1, sect. 28. The pituri shrub 
(Duboisia Hopwoodii F.v.M.) flowers about January. . . . 
" Arrived at its destination, the pituri is prepared for use as follows : -After roasting in the ashes 
the pituri chips become pliable, so as to be easily bent, and are then wetted with water if in large quantity, 
or with sputum if in small, and teased up with the fingers so as to remove all the bigger pieces. Some 
leaves of the Acacia hakeoides A. Cunn. (Boulia, ' pukartika '), or of the Acacia homalophylla A. Cunn. 
when the former is not obtainable, are next heated over the fire, and then burnt, the ashes being retained. 
The pituri in its moist state is now mixed with thc.se ashes on some smooth surface, wooden trough, &c., and 
worked with the fingers into small rolls about 21 inches long by ; inch diameter, which ' quids ' 
are now ready for chewing. Sometimes the quid is teased up with some shreds of native flax (Psoralea) 
to give it compactness and intercoherence. When not being chewed these rolls are carried worn above and 
behind the ear. Amongst the aboriginals there appears to be as great a craving for pituri as amongst 
Europeans for alcohol, a fact which is put into practical and economic use by drovers, station managers, 
and others ; local blacks will usually give anything they possess for it from their women downwards 
' not for the purpose of exciting their courage or of working them up to fighting pitch, but to produce a 
voluptuous, dreamy sensation.' Pituri may sometimes be smoked in pipes, as reported to me by Mr. 
Reardon, of Carlo, when the Mulligan blacks run short of their tobacco supply. The Kalkadun blacks 
speak of the drug as ' rnoda,' the Boulia natives call it ' tarembola 'a different name in each district." 
Physiological and Chemical Investigations. Dr. Bancroft, * 
Queensland Phil. Soc., 1872, gives a detailed account of his experiments, with extracta 
of different strengths on various animals. He thus summarises the effect of an 
infusion : 
1. Period of preliminary excitement from apparent loss of inhibitory power of the 
cerebrum, attended with rapid respiration; in cats and dogs, with vomiting 
and profuse secretion of saliva. 
2. Irregular muscular action, followed by general convulsions. 
3. Paralysis of respiratory function of medulla. 
4. Death, or 
5. Sighing inspirations at long intervals. 
6. Rapid respiration and returning consciousness. 
7. Normal respiration and general torpidity, not unattended with danger to life. 
