The Alcoholic Liquors of India

an error founded on insufficient knowledge can be easily made clear. Passages in the Mahabharata (an epic poetn dealing with events 1200 B.C., but put together about 1,000 years later), I etc., show that drunkenness was common in ancient India; and this may be gathered also from the old Hindu law books, which forbid the use of wine (e.g. Mandva-Dhdrma-Sdstra, xi., 1-46 ff). In the Abhila-Shithdrata-Cintdtnemi, a Sanskrit manual for kings and princelings, a.d. 1128, though most indecent and foolish amusments are allowed, drinking spirits etc., is prohibited ; but several different kinds of spirits are referred to (see Dr. Watt's Dictionary of Economic Products, vol. v, pp. 500, 51.0). Tavernier, in the seventeenth century (Travels in India), mentions a palm-wine spirit largely drunk by the idolators of India at their feasts. Spirits from palm juice and from rice (Sura) are alluded to by John Huyghen van Linschoten as having been largely consumed in Southern and Western India 300 years ago, and he complains of the Portuguese soldiers acquiring habits of drinking spirits from the natives. Sura is also mentioned in the Institutes of Manu, a work which, according to most Sanskrit