The ocean of story, being C.H. Tawney's translation of Somadeva's ...

256 THE OCEAN OF STORY
same time half a dram of lime. If lime is not taken, it does
not taste good, and the mind is not excited. Whoever uses
it becomes joyful,, he has a perfumed breath, perfect sleep by
reason of its aromaticity, the pleasure which it brings, and
its moderate odour. Betel replaces wine among the Indians,
by whom it is widely used."
Chau Ju~Kua (c. a.d. 1250)
The Chu-fan-chi is a work on the Chinese and Arab trade
in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries by Chau Ju-Kua, a
descendant of the Emperor Tai-tsung. After mentioning
the " areca-nut " in Annam, and " areca-nut wine " of the east
coast of Sumatra, he describes Lambri or Ceylon. Speaking
1 "
of the king he : says All day he chews a paste of areca-nut
and pearl ashes. . . . Two attendants are always present
holding a golden
dish to receive the remains of the areca-nut
(paste) chewed by the king. The king's attendants pay a
monthly fee of one i 2 of gold into the government treasury for
the privilege of getting the areca-nut (paste) remains, for it
contains " plum flower," camphor, and all kinds of precious
substances."
He also includes areca-nuts as one of the products of the
Coromandel Coast, Java, Borneo and the Philippines. We
shall return to him when speaking of betel in China (see p. 303).
Marco Polo (c. 1295)
Although the work of Marco Polo probably
contains two
references to betel-chewing, neither of them can be regarded
as undoubtedly genuine. The first passage occurs in the
geographic text (1824, c. 177, p. 213), and refers to the
"
Country of Lar "
i.e. Gujarat and the northern Konkam :
" E lor dens ont mout boune por une erbe qu'il usent a
mangier que mout fait bien pair, e molt est sanin au cors de
Tome."
This is translated by Yule "
(vol. ii, p. 365) as : They
have capital teeth, which is owing to a certain herb they chew,
1 Translated by Hirth and Rockhill, St Petersburg, 1911,pp. 72, 73. For
the other references see pp. 47, 60, 77, 78, 96, 155 and 160.
gold.
2 An i weighed 20 taels, and seems to have been used only for weighing