[Betel-Nuts.] But to specifie some of the chief of the Fruits in request among them, I begin with their Betel-Nuts, the Trees that bear them grow only on the South and West sides of this Island. They do not grow wild, they are only in their Towns, and there like unto Woods, without any inclosures to distinguish one mans Trees from anothers; but by marks of great Trees, Hummacks or Rocks each man knows his own. They plant them not, but the Nuts being ripe fall down in the grass and so grow up to [The Trees.] Trees. They are very streight and tall, few bigger than the calf of a mans Leg. [The Fruit.] The Nuts grow in bunches at the top, and being ripe look red and very lovely like a pleasing Fruit. When they gather them, they lay them in heaps until the shell be somewhat rotted, and then dry them in the Sun, and afterwards shell them with a sharp stick one and one at a time. These trees will yield some 500, some a 1000, some 1500 Nuts, and some but three or four hundred. They bear but once in the Year generally, but commonly there are green Nuts enough to eat all the Year long. [The Leaves.] The leaves of it are somewhat like those of a Coker-Nut Tree, they are five or six foot long, and have other lesser leaves growing out of the sides of them, like the feathers on each side of a quill. The Chingulays call the large leaves the boughs, and the leaves on the sides, the leaves. They fall off every Year, and the skin upon which they grow, with them. [The Skins, and their use.] These skins grow upon the body of the Tree, and the leaves grow out on them. They also clap about the buds or blossoms which bear the Nuts, and as the buds swell, so this skin-cover gives way to them, till at length it falls quite off with the great leaf on it. It is somewhat like unto Leather, and of great use unto the Countrey People. It serves them instead of Basons to eat their Rice in, and when they go a Journey to tie up their Provisions: For in these skins or leaves they can tie up any liquid substance as Oyl or water, doubling it in the middle, and rowling it in the two sides, almost like a purse. For bigness they are according to the Trees, some bigger, some less, ordinarily they are about two foot length, and a foot and an half in breadth. In this Countrey are no Inns to go to, and therefore their manner when they Travel is, to carry ready dressed what provisions they can, which they make up in these leaves. The Trees within have onely a kind of pith, and will split from one end to the other, the [The Wood.] Wood is hard and very strong; they use it for Laths for their Houses, and also for Rails for their Hedges, which are only stakes struck in the ground, and rails tyed along with rattans, or other withs growing in the Woods. [The profit the Fruit yields.] Money is not very plentiful in this Land, but by means of these Nuts, which is a great Commodity to carry to the Coasts of Cormandel, they furnish themselves with all things they want.