10 
Bajendralala Mitra— Spirituous Drinks in Ancient India. [No. 1, 
disjointed at every step, lias, in thy absence, become a torture to loving 
women.”* 
In the 7th book of that work, when describing Siva’s approach to the 
palace of Himalaya, the poet says that “ the faces of the ladies who rushed to 
the windows in great haste and with half finished toilettes, to behold the pro¬ 
cession, evolved the odour of the arrack they had drunk, and their dark eyes 
appeared like black bees on charming lotuses.”! 
Magha, in the Sisupdlabhadha describing Baladeva, says “ when he 
spoke, the aroma of liquor which had obtained sweetness by lodging in the 
mouth of Bevati, issued from his mouth. 
The Puranas abound in descriptions of wine and drinking, and, though 
the object of many of them is to condemn the use of wine, the inference is 
clear, that there was a widespread malady which they proposed to overcome. 
In some instances, moreover, the object was not reprobation, but mere de¬ 
scription, and no less an authority than the Bhagavata Purana enjoins the use 
of spirit by Brahmans at the Sautramani rite, So does Yrihaspati, the 
high priest of the gods, whose Sanhita is a standard authority on law,§ In 
the MarTcandeya Purana , the great goddess Durga is represented as parti¬ 
cularly addicted to strong drinks. Kuvera serves her with overflowing 
goblets of strong liquor, and she drinks and drinks till her eyes become 
flaming red, and she bursts out in wild laughter. When girding herself 
to prepare for her combat with the fierce demon Mahisa, she says ; “ Boar, 
roar, you fool, for a moment only, till I finish my drinking.”j| 
Other instances may be quoted ad libitum , but they are not wanted. I 
shall abstain also from extracting more passages from the poetical literature 
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