THE HISTORICAL EVIDENCE 99 



opportunities for drunkenness. But, when they 

 settled in the Promised Land, every man dwelt 

 beside his vineyard ; and, from that day till the 

 coming of the Romans, whoever among them 

 craved greatly for drink, had ample opportunities 

 of poisoning himself with it. Even since the 

 Roman Conquest the Jews have dwelt mainly in 

 the vine countries. With what result ? A drunken 

 Jew is an exceedingly rare phenomenon at the 

 present time. No doubt one may occasionally 

 hear of a Jew getting drunk.^ But a Jew drunk 

 is not necessarily a drunken Jew, i.e. an habitual 

 drunkard. Very few Jews are abstainers except on 

 medical grounds ; and they have a feast, that of 

 Purim, occurring in the month of April, when 

 drunkenness is not only permissible to them, but 

 is absolutely encouraged. Now Jews dwell in all 

 climates, they drink alcohol in all its varying 

 degrees of strength, they are exposed to all 

 manner of educational influences, some of them 

 are extremely rich and some are excessively poor ; 

 some, as in Russia and Morocco, are half savage ; 

 others, as in France and England, are highly 

 civilised. But under every condition they are 

 sober, plainly not because they resist temptation, 

 for as a race they are not particularly given to 



1 The author has in his possession a letter from Professor Brinton, 

 the American Anthropologist, in which the writer states that he never 

 heard of a case. 



