I find that among widely separated aboriginal peoples chewing is resorted to in the preparation of beverages, both intoxicating and non-intoxicating. The Gran Chaco Indians make an intoxicating drink by chewing the algarroba bean and then spitting into a receptacle. In other parts of South America berries are chewed with the same object. In some of the Pacific Islands boys and girls with good teeth are selected to chew a root (kava), from which they then prepare a drink. In New Guinea drinks are similarly prepared from roots. Boiled cassava root is chewed by the Indians of Nicaragua for the same purpose. In British Guiana the natives make a drink by adding chewed maize and saliva to sweet potato, maize, and sugar-cane. The Indians in Honduras, after steeping cassava cake or carbonised bread in hot water, chew a portion and mix it with the rest.

1 Social History of the Races of Mankind, 1881.

2 S. Powers: Tribes of California, 1877.