740 On the preparations of the Indian Hemp, or Gunjah. [[Sept. 



tions. It was famous above all for the sale of the Hasheeha, which 

 is still greedily consumed by the dregs of the populace, and from the 

 consumption of which sprung the excesses which led to the name of 

 "Assassin" being given to the Saracens in the Holy Wars. The history 

 of the drug the author treats of thus: — The oldest work in which 

 Hemp is noticed is *a treatise by Hasan, who states that in the year 

 658, m. e. the Sheikh Djafar Shirazi, a monk of the order of Haider, 

 learned from his master the history of the discovery of Hemp. Haider, 

 the chief of ascetics and self-chasteners, lived in rigid privation on a 

 mountain between Nishabor and Ramah, where he established a monas- 

 tery of Fakirs. Ten years he had spent in this retreat without leaving it 

 for a moment, till one burning summer's day when he departed alone 

 to the fields. On his return an air of joy and gaiety was imprinted on 

 his countenance ; he received the visits of his brethren and encouraged 

 their conversation. On being questioned, he stated that struck by the 

 aspect of a plant which danced in the heat as if with joy, while all the 

 rest of the vegetable creation was torpid, he had gathered and eaten of 

 its leaves. He led his companions to the spot, — all ate and all were 

 similarly excited. A tincture of the Hemp leaf in wine or spirit 

 seems to have been the favorite formula in which the Sheikh Haider 

 indulged himself. An Arab poet sings of Haider's emerald cup — an 

 evident allusion to the rich green colour of the tincture of the drug. 

 The Sheikh survived the discovery ten years, and subsisted chiefly 

 on this herb, and on his death his disciples by his desire planted it in 

 an arbour about his tomb. 



From this saintly sepulchre the knowledge of the effects of Hemp is 

 stated to have spread into Khorasan. In Chaldea it was unknown 

 until 728 m. e. during the reign of the Khalif Mostansir Billah : the 

 kings of Ormus and Bahrein then introduced it into Chaldea, Syria, 

 Egypt, and Turkey. 



In Khorasan however, it seems that the date of the use of Hemp is 

 considered to be far prior to Haider's era. Biraslan, an Indian pilgrim, 

 the contemporary of Cosroes,* is believed to have introduced and 



* By this term is probably meant the first of the Sassanian dynasty, to whom the 

 epithet "of Khusrow" or Cosroes, equivalent to Kaiser, Caesar, or Czar, has been 

 applied in many generations. This dynasty endured from a. d. 202 to a. d. 636— 

 Vide note 50 to Lane's translation of the Arabian Nights, vol. ii. p. 226. 



