“A wind blew warm from the east, and it lifted its arms hopelessly; and when the wind, love-laden with most subtle sweetness, lingered, loth to fly, the palm stood motionless upon its little green mound, and the flowers were so fresh and fair, and the leaves of the trees so deeply hued, and the native fruit so golden and glad upon the boughs, that the still warm garden air seemed only the silent, voluptuous sadness of the tree; and had I been a poet my heart would have melted in song for the proud, pining palm.”——G. W. Curtis.

Two species of a kind of pepper vine are extensively cultivated, with the areca palm, in all the countries of the East where chewing the betel is indulged in. These belong to the same family of plants as those producing the common black pepper and the long pepper of commerce. They are known to botanists as Chavica betle and Chavica siraboa. They are similar in their habits, being trailing plants, with some resemblance to the ivy, but more tender and fragile. The betel palms may be often seen with the pepper, climbing and twining around their tall, straight, slender trunks, or they are trained about poles of bamboo in the manner of hops in the hop gardens of Kent. Almost every one with a piece of land cultivates the pepper for his own consumption. In the markets incredible quantities of the leaves are offered for sale, in piles carried about in baskets. In Northern India, sheds are constructed for the growth of the pepper. These are from twenty to fifty yards in length, and eight or twelve broad, of bamboo, to shelter the plants from the sun. Great attention is paid to the cultivation, and the plants are carefully attended to, and cleaned every morning.

Betel leaf cannot be preserved in a sound state beyond eight days without preparation, but by being prepared over a fire, and rolled into balls, in which state it is called chenai, it will keep a year, only the quality is much deteriorated. In Penang the old men carry about with them a sort of metal tube, having a ramrod-looking pestle, with which they busy themselves in pounding the mixture for chewing. The young daily make nut-crackers of their jaws, and although the mixture, perhaps, rather tends to preserve the teeth, still the exercise on the nut must be a little too violent for them, and the Malays say it injures the sight. The Chinese are not much addicted to the use of the betel.

The consumption of betel by the inhabitants of Penang and Province Wellesley may be stated at 6,211,440 bundles of 100 leaves each, equal in value to 31,057 Spanish dollars, which would be the produce of 98 orlongs of land, or about 130 acres, planted regularly. But allowing for the various distances given by different cultivators between the plants 110 orlongs may be assumed, or about 147 acres.

The Chinese colonists of Singapore used the leaves of the common pepper, instead of those of the betel pepper in compounding this masticatory.

The Ava pepper, or Macropiper methysticum, is even more celebrated for its narcotic properties than the two just referred to. This plant has a thick aromatic wood stalk, and a large root, and cordate or heart-shaped leaves. It is a native of the Society, Friendly, and Sandwich Islands, where it is largely consumed. Macerated in water, the stems and root form an intoxicating beverage, and the leaves are used with the areca nut and lime, in the same manner as the leaves of the other peppers.28

Mariner gives an account, in his “History of the Tonga Islands,” of the use of this plant. The root is split up with an axe into small pieces, and after being scraped clean with mussel shells, is handed out to those in attendance to be chewed. There is then a buzz in the assembly, contrasting curiously with the silence which reigned before, several crying out, “Give me some cava! give me cava,” each of those who intend to chew it crying out for some to be handed to him. No one offers to chew the cava but young persons who have good teeth, clean mouths, and no colds. Women frequently assist. It is astonishing how remarkably dry they preserve the root during the process of mastication. In about two minutes, each person having chewed his quantity, takes it out of his mouth with his hand, and puts it on a piece of plantain or banana leaf, or he raises the leaf to his mouth, and puts it off from his tongue, in the form of a ball of tolerable consistence. The different portions of cava being now chewed, which is known by the silence that ensues, a large wooden bowl is placed on the ground before the man who is to make the infusion. Each person passes up his portion of the chewed root, which is placed in the bowl, wherein they are laid in such a manner that each portion is distinct and separate from the rest, till the whole inside of the bowl becomes studded, from the bottom up to the rim, on every side. The man, before whom the bowl is placed, now tilts it up a little towards the chief, that he may see the quantity of its contents, saying, “This is the cava chewed.” If the chief thinks there is enough, he says, “Cover it over, and let there come a man here.” The bowl is covered over with a plantain or banana leaf, if there is not enough, and a man fetches more root to be chewed. If there is enough, the chief says “mix.” The two men, who sit on each side of him, who is to prepare the cava, now come forward a little, and making a half turn, sit opposite to each other, the bowl being between them, one of these fans off the flies with a large leaf, while the other sits ready to pour in the water from cocoa-nut shells, one at a time.

Before this is done, however, the man who is about to mix, having first rinsed his hands with a little of the water, kneads together the chewed root, gathering it up from all sides of the bowl, and compressing it together. Upon this an attendant says, “Pour in the water,” and the man on one side of the bowl continues pouring, fresh shells being handed to him, until the attendant thinks there is sufficient, and says, “Stop the water.” The mixture is stirred together at the command of the attendant, who then says, “Put in the fow,” which is the bark of a tree stripped into small fibres, and has the appearance of willow shavings. A large quantity of this substance, enough to cover the whole surface of the infusion, is now put in by one of those seated beside the bowl, and it floats upon the surface. The man who manages the bowl now begins his difficult operation. In the first place, he extends his left hand to the further side of the bowl, with the fingers pointing downwards and the palm towards himself; he sinks that hand carefully down the side of the bowl, carrying with it the edge of the fow; at the same time his right hand is performing a similar operation at the side next to him, the fingers pointing downwards and the palm presenting outwards. He does this slowly from side to side, gradually descending deeper and deeper, till his fingers meet each other at the bottom, so that nearly the whole of the fibres of the root are by these means enclosed in the fow, forming, as it were, a roll of about two feet in length, lying along the bottom from side to side, the edges of the fow meeting each other underneath. He now carefully rolls it over, so that the edges overlapping each other, or rather intermingling, come uppermost. He next doubles in the two ends and rolls it carefully over again, endeavouring to reduce it to a narrower and firmer compass. He now brings it cautiously out of the fluid, taking firm hold by the two ends, and raising it breast high, with his arms extended; by a series of movements the mass is more and more twisted and compacted together, while the infusion drains from it in a regular decreasing quantity, till, at length, it denies a single drop. He now gives it to the person on his left side and receives fresh fow from the one on the right. The operation is again renewed, with a view to collect what might before have escaped him, and even a third time till no dregs are left which this process can remove.

During the above operation, various people are employed in making cava cups from the unexpanded leaves of the banana, folded and tied in a peculiar manner. The infusion being strained, the performance generally occupying a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes, the man at the bowl calls out, “The cava is clear.” The infusion is now filled into the cups by means of a bundle of fow which is dipped into the bowl, and when replete with the liquid, held over the cup, and being compressed, the liquid runs out till the cup is filled. With certain other ceremonies the cups are passed round amongst the company.

From this account it will be seen that the beverage is drank immediately after it is prepared, without being in any manner fermented, its intoxicating and narcotic properties must, therefore, be due to the root. This liquor is indulged in to a large extent in the islands of Oceanica, where the natives are generally passionately fond of it.

Another substance entering into the composition of the “buyo” is the extract of the leaves of the gambir (Uncaria gambir). There are different qualities of extract: the first and best is white, brittle, and has an earthy appearance when rubbed between the fingers, which earthy appearance gave it the name of Terra Japonica, being supposed, at first, also, to come from Japan, and is formed into very small round cakes. This is the most expensive kind, and most refined, but it is not unfrequently adulterated with sago; this kind is brought in the greatest quantity from the island of Sumatra. The second quality is of a brownish yellow colour, is formed into oblong cakes, and when broken has a light brown earthy appearance; it is also made into a solid cubic form; it is sold in the bazaars in small packets, each containing five or six. The third quality contains more impurities than the preceding, is formed in small circular cakes, and sold, in packages of five or six, in the bazaars.

The method employed in making the extract is thus described in the Singapore Chronicle:—The leaves are collected three or four times a year; they are thrown into a large cauldron, the bottom of which is formed of iron, the upper part of bark and boiled for five or six hours, until a strong decoction is inspissated, it is then allowed to cool, when the extract subsides. The water is drawn off, a soft, soapy substance remains, which is cut into large masses; these are further divided by a knife into small cubes, about an inch square, or into still smaller pieces, which are laid in frames to dry. This catechu has more of a granular uniform appearance than that of Bengal, it is, perhaps, also less pure. The younger leaves of the shrub are said to produce the whitest and best gambir, the older a brown and inferior sort. The men employed in the gambir plantations generally indulge freely in the use of opium.

Another extract made in India from the wood of Acacia Catechu,29 and which bears the name of Cutch or “Kutt,” is used in combination with the betel nut. The trees are cut down, and the heart-wood chopped and boiled in water, strained off, and evaporated. This is poured into clay moulds and dried in the sun. Dr. Hooker gives a sketch from the life of one of the native “Kutt” makers of India:——

“At half-past eight a.m. it suddenly fell calm, and we proceeded to Chakuchee, the native carts breaking down in their passage over the projecting beds of flinty rocks, or as they hurried down the inclined planes which cut through the precipitous banks of the streams. Near Chakuchee we passed an alligator, just killed by two men—a foul beast about nine feet long, and of the Mager kind. More interesting than its natural history was the painful circumstance of its having just swallowed a child that was playing in the water, while its mother was washing her domestic utensils in the river. The brute was hardly dead, much distended by its prey, and the mother standing beside it. A very touching group was this! the parent with hands clasped in agony, unable to withdraw her eyes from the cursed reptile, which still clung to life with that tenacity for which its tribe is so noted, and beside her the two men leaning on their bloody bamboo staves with which they had all but despatched the animal.

“The poor woman who had lost her child earns a scanty maintenance by making catechu. She inhabits a little cottage, and has no property but her two oxen to bring wood from the hills, and a very few household chattels, and how few these are is known only to persons who have seen the meagre furniture of the Dangha hovels. Her husband cuts the trees in the forest and drags them to the hut, but he is now sick, and her only son, her future stay, was he whose end is just related. Her daily food is rice, with beans from the beautiful flowered dolichos, trailing round the cottage, and she is in debt to the contractor, who has advanced her two rupees, to be worked off in three months, by the preparation of 240 lbs. of catechu. The present was her second husband, an old man; by him she never had any children, and in this respect alone did the poor creature think herself very unfortunate, for her poverty she did not feel. Rent to the Rajah, tax to the police, and rates to the Brahminee priest, are all paid from an acre of land, yielding so wretched a crop of barley, that it more resembled a fallow field than a harvest field. All day long she is boiling down the catechu-wood cut into chips, and pouring the decoction into large wooden troughs, where it is inspissated.”

From the areca nut another kind of catechu is prepared, which is generally preferred as a masticatory. Heyne thus describes the process of its manufacture, “Areca nuts are taken as they come from the tree, and boiled for some hours in an iron vessel. They are then taken out and the remaining water is inspissated by continued boiling. This process furnishes kassu, or most stringent terra japonica, which is black, and mixed with paddy husks and other impurities. After the nuts are dried, they are put in a fresh quantity of water, boiled again, and the water, being inspissated like the former, yields the best or dearest kind of catechu, called coury. It is yellowish brown, has an earthy fracture, and is free from the admixture of foreign bodies.” It is probable that the flat round cakes, covered with paddy husks, met with in commerce is the kassu of Heyne.

The husk which surrounds the nut, and which is of a fibrous nature, resembling the coir of the cocoa nut is thrown away by tons, and allowed to rot. This substance has lately been experimented upon for the manufacture of paper, for which purpose it appears to be available, and, as there is no want of the raw material, perhaps at some future time it will become utilized as extensively as the “coir” of Ceylon.

The Bombay catechu is obtained from Acacia catechu, and the Bengal catechu from Uncaria Gambir. The Bombay produce is of a dark brownish red colour, and is stated to be the richer of the two in tannin. The Bombay variety is commonly called “cutch,” while the Bengal produce is of a lighter brown colour, and is termed “terra.” Catechu of good quality is also obtained from Pegu.

The catechu exported from Madras to England, Bombay, France, and Ceylon was—

But this is only a small proportion of the catechu consumed in England alone, since in 1849 we imported 169,140 cwts. of that substance for tanning purposes, and the quantity has since increased.

The totals of cutch and gambier imported in

• 1856 was 8,536 tons.
• 1857 was 11,047 tons.
• 1858 was 11,205 tons.
• 1859 was 13,762 tons.

Of this quantity we exported in—

• 1856—1,031 tons.
• 1857—1,427 tons.
• 1858— 974 tons.
• 1859—1,809 tons.

These articles, therefore, make no insignificant item in our East Indian trade, which, valued at the intermediate rate of 15s. and 30s. per cwt., would amount to the sum of £153,375 in 1858.