DRU 



DRU 



families; and were held, both by the 

 honours of their birth and their office, in 

 the greatest veneration. They are said 

 to have understood astrology, geometry, 

 natural history, politics, and geography : 

 they had the administration of all sa- 

 cred things, were the interpreters of re- 

 ligion, and the judges of all affairs indif- 

 ferently. 



Whoever refused obedience to them 

 was declared impious and accursed ; 

 they held the immortality of the soul, 

 and the metempsychosis ; they are divid- 

 ed by some into several classes ; they 

 had a chief, or arch-druid, in every na- 

 tion : he was a sort of high-priest, having 

 an absolute authority over the rest, and 

 was succeeded by the most considerable 

 among his survivors. The youth used 

 to be instructed by them, retiring with 

 them to caves and desolate forests, where 

 they were sometimes kept twenty years. 

 They preserved the memory and actions 

 of great men by their verses ; but are 

 said to have sacrificed men to Mercu- 

 ry. Caesar imagined that the druids came 

 from Britain into Gaul, but several a- 

 mong the modern writers are of a differ- 

 ent opinion. 



DRUM, is a military musical instru- 

 ment, in form of a cylinder, hollow with- 

 in, and covered at the two ends with 

 vellum, which is stretched or slacken- 

 ed at pleasure, by the means of small 

 cords and sliding knots. It is beat up- 

 on with sticks. Some drums are made 

 of brass, but they are commonly of 

 wood. There are several beats of the 

 drum, as assembly, chamade, reveille, re- 

 treat, &c. 



DRUM of the ear. See ASATOMT. 



DRUMS, kettle^ are two sorts of large ba- 

 sins of copper or brass, rounded in the 

 bottom, and covered with vellum or goat- 

 skin, which is kept fast by a circle of iron, 

 and several holes fastened to the body of 

 the drum, and a like number of screws 

 to screw up and down. They are much 

 used among the horse, as also in operas, 

 oratorios, concerts, &c. 



DRUMMER, he that beats the drum, 

 of whom each company of foot has one, 

 and sometimes two. Every regiment 

 has a drum major, who has the com- 

 mand over the other drums. They are 

 distinguished from the soldiers by clothes 

 of a different fashion: their post, when 

 a battalion is drawn up, is on the flanks, 

 and on a march it is betwixt the divi- 

 sions. 



DRUNKENNESS, theory of. The com- 

 mon and immediate effect of wine is to 



dispose to joy, i. e. to introduce such 

 kinds and degrees of vibrations into the 

 whole nervous system, or into the sepa- 

 rate parts thereof, as are attended with 

 a moderate continued pleasure. This it. 

 seems to do chiefly by impressing agree- 

 able sensations upon the stomach and 

 bowels, which are thence propagated 

 into the brain, continue there, and also 

 call up the several associated pleasures 

 that have been formed from pleasant im- 

 pressions made upon the alimentary duct, 

 or even upon any of the external senses. 

 But wine has also probably a considera- 

 ble effect of the same kind, after it is ab- 

 sorbed by the veins and lacteals, viz. by 

 the impressions which it makes on the 

 solids, considered as productions of the 

 nerves, while it circulates with the 

 fluds in an unassimilated state, in the 

 same manner as may be observed of 

 opium ; which resembles wine in this 

 respect also, that it produces one species 

 of temporary madness. And we may 

 suppose, that analogous observations hold 

 with regard to all the medicinal and 

 poisonous bodies, which are found to 

 produce considerable disorders in the 

 mind ; their greatest and most immediate 

 effect arises from the impressions made 

 on the stomach, and the disorderly 

 vibrations propagated thence into the 

 brain ; and yet it- seems, probable, that 

 such particles as are absorbed produce 

 a similar effect in circulating with the 

 blood. 



Wine, after it is absorbed, must rarefy 

 the blood, and consequently distend the 

 veins and sinuses, so as to make them 

 compress the medullary substance, and 

 the nerves themselves, both in their 

 origin and progress ; it must, therefore, 

 dispose to some degree of a palsy of the 

 sensations and motions, to which there 

 will be a farther disposition, from the 

 great exhaustion of the nervous capilla- 

 ments and medullary substance, whicli 

 a continued state of gaiety and mirth, 

 with the various expressions of it, has oc- 

 casioned. It is moreover to be noted, 

 that the pleasant vibrations producing 

 this gaiety, by rising higher and higher 

 perpetually, as more wine is taken into 

 the stomach and blood vessels, come at 

 last to border upon, and even to pass 

 into, the disagreeable vibrations belong- 

 ing to the passions of anger, jealousy, 

 envy, &c. more especially if any of the 

 mental causes of these be presented at 

 the same time. 



Now it seems, that, from a comparison 

 of these and such things with each other. 



