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

266 THE OCEAN OF STORY
which name is now given to a bundle of 14,000. Bundles of
200 are called Dholi ; a lahdsah is made up of dholis. In
winter they turn and arrange the leaves after four or five
days ; in summer every day. From five to twenty-five
leaves, and sometimes more, are placed above each other,
and adorned in various ways. They also put some betel-nut
and katfh on one leaf, and some chalk paste on another, and
roll them up : this is called a berah. Some put camphor and
musk into it, and tie both leaves with a silk thread. Others
put single leaves on plates, and use them thus. They are
also prepared as a dish."
We can pass over the brief accounts given by other
travellers of the first half of the seventeenth century, as
giving us no new information. I refer to such men as
1
2
Francois Pyrard of Laval (1601-1608); Sir Thomas Roe
3
(1615-1617); Edward Terry (1616-1619); and Pietro Delia
Valle 4
(1623).
We can pause, however, for a moment with Peter Mundy.
Peter Mundy (1628-1634)
In Relation VI he speaks of " feilds of Paan or Beetle,"
but in Relation VIII (1632) he speaks of " Bettlenutt," thus
confounding the names of the two ingredients, a mistake
which has been faithfully copied ever since. As we shall see
very shortly, Fryer made matters worse by calling the betelleaf
" Arach " and the areca-seeds " Bettle." Under the
heading " Paan what it is," 5
Mundy writes as follows 6 :
" Wee also sawe some feilds of Paan, which is a kinde of
leafe much used to bee eaten in this Countrie, thus : First
they take a kinde of Nutt called Saparoz, and commonly
with us Bettlenutt, which, broken to peeces, they infold in
one of the said leaves, and soe put it into their mouthes. Then
1 See Gray's edition for the Hakluyt Society, 1887, 1889, vol. ii, pt. ii,
pp. 362-363.
2 See Foster's edition for the Hakluyt Society, 1899, vol. i, pp. 19-20;
and vol. ii, p. 453ft.
3 Foster, Early Travels in India, p. 300.
4 See Grey's edition for tlie Hakluyt Society, 1892, vol. i, pp. 36-37.
5 In the Harl. MS. 2286 Mundy has added "and the use of it."
6 See Temple's edition for the Hakluyt Society, vol. ii, pp. 96-97.