a knowledge of the use of the still from the inhabitants of India, than that they, themselves, had been in possession of the art to which the genius of their religion was so directly opposed, because it is certain from the researches of Sir William Jones, that the Hindoos were acquainted with all the chemical arts which were said to have been invented by the Egyptians, apparently before the latter had even acquired the rank or title of a civilized people. The expedition of Osiris to India, where it is said he reigned 52 years, and established many Egyptian colonies, joined to the conquests of Sesostris, furnishes proofs that the Egyptians had an early intercourse with India. When Cambyses invaded Egypt, it is well known that many of the inhabitants fled to India, as a country with which they were familiar. It is also asserted, that in the time of Solomon and during the Trojan war, the Egyptian and Phoenician fleets, as well as those of the Hebrews, visited India and traded thither; so that there must have been a reciprocal interchange of such arts, sciences, and manufactures as were at that time known to the world. To use the expressive language of Doctor Robertson, "what now is in India always was there and is likely still to continue-neither the ferocious violence and illiberal fanatacism of its Mahometan conquerors, nor the power of its European masters, have effected any considerable alteration. The same distinctions of condition take place; the same arrangements in civil and domestic society remain; the same maxims of religion are held in veneration, and the same sciences and arts are cultivated.*"

Wine being, among the Mussulmans, a prohibited article, no commerce could be carried on by them in that commodity. The Indians, however, continued to manufacture wines from various substances and under different names. The chief of these was the Tàri, or the fermented juice of the palmyra tree, procured from the Borassus flabelliformis of Linnæus, the Tal or Tar of Bengal, and the Pannamaram of the Tamuls. In some parts of India, this tree grows spontaneously; in others, it is cultivated with great care. When planted in a fertile soil, and of thirty years growth, it yields, according to Buchannan, callu or palm wine, from the 11th of January to the 11th of June. One active man is considered competent to manage forty trees. Previous to the bursting of the membrane which covers the flowering branch, called by botanists the spatha or spadix, the workman mounts the tree by means of a strap passed round his back, and a rope round his feet, and bruises the part between two flat

Robertson's Ancient India, Appendix, p. 152.

pieces of stick; this is done for three successive mornings, and on each of the four following ones he cuts a thin slice from the top to prevent the spatha from bursting. On the eighth morning, a clear sweet liquor begins to flow from the wound, which is collected in a pot suspended for that purpose. A good tree will discharge daily about three quarts of juice, which, if intended for drinking, will keep three days; in the fourth, it becomes sour, and what is not sold or drunk is distilled into arrack. This exudation, if continued for three years, will kill the tree; which, however, is generally considered as yielding more profit in this way, than if preserved for the sake of its nuts or for any other purpose. As there are different species of palm trees, there is a diversity of quality in their respective produce, which have accordingly distinct appellations among the natives; but to all of which the English apply the general name of Toddy, a corruption of the Mussulman common term Tàri. The wild date (Elate Sylvestris) the Mahometans call Sinday; in the Carnatic language, Hinda ; and in the Telinga and Tamul dialects, callu. This latter term signifies thief, on account of its stealing away the senses. The Sinday is never drunk till after fermentation, which is soon effected by the influence of the sun, and then the liquor is exceedingly intoxicating. When distilled and rectified, it affords a good spirit. Toddy is considered as a cooling and extremely wholesome beverage, operating on some constitutions as a gentle cathartic. European soldiers use it in large quantities when they cannot get arrack, and render it more potent, according to Captain Mundy, by the addition of chillies.* In some parts of India, whole woods of the cocoa-tree are set apart for the purpose of procuring toddy, and the saccharine quality of the fluid is so great as to produce a yeast or barm, similar to that obtained from our malt worts. In the pots intended to receive juice to be boiled into jaggory, (a kind of sugar to which it is occasionally converted,) a little quick lime is put to prevent fermentation, or absorb any acidity which might arise, and the juice must be boiled the same day on which it is taken from the tree. Twelve trees, on an average, daily fill a pot, which, when boiled down, gives six gallons of jaggory. In some places, the tàri is used only for drinking; but where it is very plentiful, it is made into jaggory; and the poor people use it as a substitute for that extracted from the sugar-cane. Forbes says, that three quarts of the tàri produce a pound of sugar.†

It is stated, that the wild date tree, from which toddy is extracted,

* Pen and Pencil Sketches of India. † Oriental Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 452.

was formerly very abundant in the dominions of the late Tippoo Sultan, who, observing that his subjects frequently debased themselves with tari, commanded all the trees to be cut down, and in places near the capital the order was strictly executed.* He even attempted the absolute prohibition of spirituous liquors.

The order of Tippoo to destroy the palm tree is very extraordinary, as this tree has been held in great estimation, from the most remote period, both in Asia and Africa; while the followers of Mahomet believe it to be peculiar to those favoured countries in which his religion is professed, notwithstanding the prohibition in the Alcoran of the use of intoxicating drinks. "Honour the palm tree," says a Mahometan writer, "for she is your father's aunt," because, says he, "this tree was formed from the remainder of the clay from which Adam was created.”—Thus it would seem to have been considered a distinguished inhabitant of paradise, and a rival of the vine in its use and excellence.

Heber tells us that the vine seemed to thrive well in some of those parts of India which he visited, and that the plants looked beautiful, but were not sufficiently trimmed, at least so close as to render them productive.†

When Fitch, a London merchant, was in India, in 1583, he found the people well versed in the making of palm wine and its distillation. In 1644, Bennin met with arrack as a drink very familiar; and mentions a liquor called bouleponge, made of arrack, black sugar, juice of lemon, water, and a little muscadine. Sir Thomas Roe, who visited the Great Mogul, from the court of James the I., found palmiso wine and cocoa milk in current use; and at that time, the people appeared to be well acquainted with wine and various other sorts of drink. The cups, then in use, were of massive gold set with the most brilliant gems. These were usually handed to the visiter on a plate of the same metal: the one presented to Sir Thomas was adorned with about 2000 precious stones, and the gold of it weighed about twenty ounces. It was customary in those times to mix pearls and precious gems with wine and other strong drink. A present of this kind was offered to Mr. Burnes, during his late tour through India, by Runjeet Sing, a native prince.

In India, the sugar-cane is cultivated to a great extent. In the whole range from Decca to Delhi, says Heber, and thence through

* Buchanan's Journey through the Mysore, vol. i. p. 56.

Heber's Narrative of a Journey thro' the Upper Provinces of India, 2 vols. 4to.

the greater part of Rajpootana and Malwah, the raising of sugar is as usual a part of husbandry as that of turnips or potatoes in England; and sugar is prepared in every form except the loaf.

It was a practice among the Mogul monarchs, when in the splendour of power, to have their elephants, usually amounting to 5000, fed on sugar and arrack. The Punjabee chiefs still feed their horses on sugar, and these animals are very spirited, and do not agree with any other food.*

The jaggory, which is extracted from the sugar-cane, and from which the greater part of the native rum is manufactured, is thus procured. The canes are cut into pieces six inches long, and bruised in a mill; the juice which flows from them is strained through a' cotton cloth into a boiler, to which is added a certain quantity of lime water. When the evaporation has reduced it to a proper consistence, it is put into a large pot to cool, then poured into a mould having a hundred holes, each in shape of a quadrilateral inverted pyramid. The frame being turned over, the balls fall out, and after being placed on leaves for a day, are exposed for sale, at a price yarying from six to twelve shillings the hundred weight. Thus jaggory appears to contain both sugar and molasses, and resembles the product, which in Jamaica comes out of the cooler before it is taken to the curing house, being a little more inspissated, and requiring about 37 gallons to the hundred weight. Heber, during his perigrination through the upper provinces, observed a very simple description of a machine for extracting sugar from the cane. It consisted of a large vat under ground, covered with a stout platform, in the centre of which was a wooden cylinder, apparently the hollowed stump of a tree. In this was a strong piece of timber fixed as in a socket, turned round by a beam, to which two oxen were fastened. Behind the oxen, a man sat thrusting in pieces of cane, about a foot long, between the upright timber and its socket. These being crushed by the action of the timbers, the juice ran down into a vat below. Stones would be preferable to this mode of grinding, on the principle of a common mill; but they cannot be procured thereof a durable and proper quality: hence the article produced in the remote provinces is of a coarse description. The profit of jaggory either from the cane or the palm is equally divided between the farmer and the goverment. From palms alone, a considerable revenue is raised, the regulations for which differ in different districts. In one

Jacquemont's Letters from India, vol. ii. p. 215.

Heber's Narrative vol. ii. p 252.

place, when a person plants a garden, the trees are considered as his property, he paying one half of the produce to the state; in another, they are let in lots at the rate of £40 per annum. Those are again farmed to some of the inferior villagers, who extract and distil the juices. Could the jaggory from the sugar cané, observes Buchanan, be generally converted either into a palatable spirituous liquor or into sugar, the barren plains of the Carnatic might be rendered productive. The former suggestion appears to be not impracticable, and deserves attention in the way of experiment. If it should answer, the whole of the grain distilled in Europe might be saved for food.* On the same principle, Heber is of opinion that almost the whole of the Deccan might be cultivated with vines; and that it would be wise in the British government to encourage a speculation of that kind, were it only for the purpose of obtaining a better beverage for the troops than the brandy now in use. The grapes of Nusseerabad are said to equal those of Shiraz, and the vineyards there are become famous all over India: a sufficient encouragement to make the plantation of the vine more general in that quarter. Such speculations would be well repaid by the employment of so vast a population as occupy those regions:

Throughout the Carnatic, the distillation of rum or brandy is car ried on by a particular caste; and the process observed in some of the provinces is described as follows. From the Topala, (Mimosa leucophlea,) a tree common in the country, the bark is taken and cut into chips, of which about four pounds are added to the twenty-four pounds and quarter of sugar-cane jaggory, with a quantity of water equal to twice the bulk of this sweet substance. The mixture is made in an earthen jar kept in the shade; the fermentation, commencing in about twenty-four hours, is completed on the twelfth day, when the liquor is distilled by means of the following apparatus:-The body of the still (a a a) is a strong earthen jar, capable of containing three times the bulk of the materials. On this is luted with cow-dung a copper head (bbb) having on the inside a gutter (cc) for collecting the vapour that has been condensed into spirit by a constant small stream of water, which falls on the head at (f). This water is conveyed away by the pipe (g), while the spirit is conducted into a jar by the pipe (d). The mode of condensing the spirit is very rude; and the liquor, which is never rectified by a second distillation, is execrable. The natives allege that the bark of the Topala, which is very insipid to the taste, is