ARAB USES OP THE DATE 195 



dangers, real or imaginary, arising from dates. Eaten 

 before they are ripe they cause skin eruptions, fever, 

 headaches, constipation, stomach and bowel troubles, 

 and injury to the gums. When ripe and fresh they 

 are more dangerous than when cured; but he admits 

 that they may be valuable to thin thick blood, and 

 closes with the caution that persons with hot tem- 

 peraments should always eat their dates with vinegar, 

 fermented honey, fresh greens, sour milk, or acid 

 pomegranates. To recover from such an attack we 

 shall have to fall back once more on Muhammad, 

 who advised his followers to eat fresh and cured dates 

 together whenever they could, in order to thwart the 

 devil, because that personage has said: "Man will re- 

 main as long as he mingles the new with the old." 

 This is related by Abd al Rizzaq,* who adds com- 

 fortingly that "the sap of palm leaves is a sure 

 remedy for nervousness, kidney trouble, and putrid 

 wounds; it calms the effervescence of the blood and 

 is a tonic for the stomach. " 



Although the Muslim's religion prohibits the 

 manufacture of intoxicating drinks, this law has 

 never been strictly regarded, so the Arab not only 

 makes a variety of "soft" beverages from the palm, 

 but several that are decidedly alcohohc and others 

 which are on the dividing line. The last are popular, 

 for if it is granted that their use is lawful when they are 

 newly made, one may drink them when they begin 

 to ferment and yet ease his conscience by refusing to 

 recognize that such a process is taking place — a 

 moral and mental phenomenon that is familiar enough 

 in the case of hard cider in the Occident. Thus palm 



*Abd al Rizzaq al Jazair!, "The Relation of Enigmas" ('seven- 

 teenth or eighteenth century A. D.). Tr. by Dr. Lucien Leclere. 

 Paris, 1874. 



