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with medical men to say how long this unalterable, unrelenting foe of the human race, shall remain secure in this sacred, but usurped retreat. They have the power, and theirs is the duty to perform the mighty exorcism. Let the united effort soon be made, and the fiend be thrust forth from this strong but unnatural alliance and companionship with men, and cast into that "outer darkness" which lies beyond the precincts of human suffering and human enjoyment."*

* Temperance Prize Essay, by Dr. Mussey. Washington, 1835.

PART III.

CHAPTER IX.

HISTORY OF INTOXICATING LIQUORS.

Man is the only animal accustomed to swallow unnatural drinks, or to abuse those which are natural; and this is a fruitful source of a great variety of his bodily and mental evils.-Rees Cycloped. Art. Water.

THE History of Intoxicating Liquors, presents strong examples of the ingenuity and perseverance of mankind, in the pursuit of animal gratification.

In the countries so frequently the scenes of Scripture incidents, the fruits from which wine was made, were grown in great profusion and variety. Grapes in particular were remarkable for their size and delicious flavour. The spies sent out by Joshua, found in the valley of Eshcol, a bunch of grapes which required two men to carry it. Doubdan, the traveller, while in the neighbourhood of Bethlehem, visited this valley, and was informed by some monks, that bunches were found which, even without the aid of cultivation, weighed from ten to twelve pounds. Forster, was also informed by a person who had resided many years in Palestine, that bunches of

*

* Voyage de la Terre Sainte, ch. 21.

grapes were found in the valley of Hebron, so large, that two men could scarcely carry one of them. Rosenmuller confirms this statement. Besides, he mentions, the large quantities of grapes and raisins, which are daily sent to the markets of Jerusalem, and other neighbouring places, Hebron alone, in the first half of the eighteenth century, annually sent 300 camel loads, that is, nearly three hundred thousand weight of grape-juice, or honey of raisins, to Egypt.

The grape and other esculent and luscious fruits, form a very important part of human nourishment in those parts of the globe, where they are plentifully produced. The heat of the climate prevents that desire for solid diet, which characterizes the inhabitants of the colder regions of the earth. Travellers relate, that grapes enter largely into the provisions made for their entertainments. Morden, for example, informs us, that at a visit made to the Aga of Essuaens, he was presented with coffee, and several bunches of grapes of delicious taste.

The juice of the grape and of other fruits grown in hot countries, possesses peculiarly refreshing and invigorating properties. It is generally diluted with water. A recent traveller, thus beautifully alludes to this practice :"Fatigued with heat and thirst, we came to a few cottages in a palm-wood, and stopped to drink of a fountain. of delicious water. In this northern climate, no idea can be formed of the exquisite luxury, of drinking in Egypt; little appetite for food is felt-but, when after crossing the burning sands, you reach the rich line of woods on the brink of the Nile, and pluck the fresh limes, and mixing the juice with Egyptian sugar and the soft river water, drink repeated bowls of lemonade, you feel every other pleasure of the senses must yield to this. One then perceives the beauty and force of those similes in Scripture, where the sweetest emotions of the heart are compared to the assuaging of thirst in a sultry land."*

that

The fruit and juice of the palm-tree, the pomegranate, the melon, and the grape, have, in every age, been deemed of the highest importance, both as articles of diet, and of refreshing drink.

* Carne's "Letters from the East."

"The pomegranate in most parts of Persia," remarks Forster, "has a thin soft skin, and contains a large quantity of juice, than which nothing, in hot weather or after fatigue can be more grateful.”*

The use of water melons in Egypt, is thus adverted to by Hasselquist. "The water melon serves the Egyptians for meat, drink, and physic. It is eaten in abundance during the season, even by the richer sort of people; but the common people scarcely eat anything else, and account this the best time of the year, as they are obliged to put up with worse fare, at other seasons. This fruit likewise serves them for drink; the juice so refreshes these poor creatures, that they have much less occasion for water, than if they were to live on more substantial food in this burning climate."+

The practices of modern nations demonstrate the importance of these vegetables and their juices. Hence, we are enabled to derive some knowledge as to the habits and customs of the ancients, whose practices in many respects are known not to have differed from those of the present day.

The ancients, doubtless, at an early period, acquired the knowledge of fermentation. The juice of the grape, or other fruits, in warm climates spontaneously runs into decay or fermentation; and its exhilirating effects on the human frame would not long remain unknown. "The grapes,' ," remarks Sir Edward Barry, "became at first, a useful part of their aliment, and the recently expressed juices a cooling drink. These, by a spontaneous fermentation, soon acquired a vinous quality." "The Indians, in the same manner, discovered similar virtue in their palm trees; they first made incisions in

* Forster. Pinkerton's Collect. of Travels, vol. ix. p. 304. "The abundant and agreeable acid-juice which the fruit of the pomegranate affords, gives it every where a very high place in the estimation of the Orientals. It is not only eaten with great zest in its natural state, but its inspissated juice, forms a most agreeable and refreshing beverage in those countries, where sherbets prepared with the juice of fruits, form the most delicious of the drinks, in which the people are allowed to indulge."-Pictorial Bible, Deut. ch. viii. v. 8.

+ Hasselquist's Iter Palaestinum.

the bark, with a view of drinking the cooling liquor which distilled from them, but soon found that by being kept in vessels it acquired different and more agreeable qualities."*

The unfermented juice of the palm-tree is described by a celebrated oriental scholar as the "Palm Wine" of the poets. Man, however, prostitutes this as well as other beneficent gifts of the Creator to the gratification of his animal passions.

"The fermented juice of the palm-tree is more powerfully intoxicating than that of the vine. A small incision being made, there oozes in gentle drops a cool pleasant liquor called toddy, the palm wine of the poets. This, when first drawn is cooling and salutary, but when fermented and distilled produces an intoxicating liquor."+

"The liquor extracted from the palm-tree is the most seducing and pernicious of intoxicating vegetable juices; when, just drawn it is as pleasant as Pouhon water fresh from the spring. From this liquor, according to Rheede, sugar is extracted; and it would be a happy circumstance if it were always applied to so innocent a purpose."‡

The palm-trees of Judea, in particular, were excellent in their quality. They were also grown in great abundance.§

The pages of the Old Testament present numerous proofs of the simple diet of the people in ancient times. Boaz invited Ruth to eat of his bread, and to dip her morsel in the vinegar, a liquor which appears to have been somewhat analogous to the very weak acidulous wines used in the present day by the Spaniards, Italians, and French. Water undoubtedly was the common and usual drink of the primitive Hebrews. The heat of the climate, however, rendered the addition of vinegar or

* Barry's "Wines of the Ancients," chap. Forbes' Oriential Memoirs, vol. i. p. 22, 24.

, p. 22.

Sir William Jone's Works, vol. i. p. 257, vol. ii. p. 117. § Fiunt (vina) et è pomis :-primumque è palmis, quo Parthi et Indi utuntur et Oriens totus: maturarum modio in aquæ congiis tribus macerato expressoque.-Plin. xiv. 19. "Ab his cariota (palmæ) maxime celebrantur; et cibo quidem, sed et succo, uberrimæ. Exquibus præcipua vina Orienti ; iniqua capiti, unde pomo nomen.”—Id. xiii. 9.

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