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 any danger of falling on your hinder parts; for the people who drink what Simonides calls—

Wine, the brave router of all melancholy,

can never suffer such a mischance as that. But as Aristotle says, in his book on Drunkenness, they who have drunk beer, which they call [Greek: pinos], fall on their backs. For he says, "But there is a peculiarity in the effects of the drink made from barley, which they call [Greek: pinos], for they who get drunk on other intoxicating liquors fall on all parts of their body; they fall on the left side, on the right side, on their faces, and on their backs. But it is only those who get drunk on beer who fall on their backs, and lie with their faces upwards." But the wine which is made of barley is by some called [Greek: brytos], as Sophocles says, in his Triptolemus—

And not to drink the earthy beer ([Greek: bryton]).

And Archilochus says—

And she did vomit wine as any Thracian Might vomit beer ([Greek: bryton]), and played the wanton stooping.

And Æschylus, also, mentions this drink, in his Lycurgus—

And after this he drank his beer ([Greek: bryton]), and much And loudly bragg'd in that most valiant house.

But Hellanicus, in his Origins, says that beer is made also out of roots, and he writes thus:—"But they drink beer ([Greek: bryton]) made of roots, as the Thracians drink it made of barley." And Hecatæus, in the second book of his Description of the World, speaking of the Egyptians, and saying that they are great bread-eaters, adds, "They bruise barley so as to make a drink of it." And, in his Voyage round Europe, he says that "the Pæonians drink beer made of barley, and a liquor called [Greek: parabiê], made of millet and conyza. And they anoint themselves," adds he, "with oil made of milk." And this is enough to say on these topics.

68. But in our time dear to the thyrsus-bearers Is rosy wine, and greatest of all gods Is Bacchus.

As Ion the Chian says, in his Elegies—

For this is pretext fit for many a song; The great assemblies of th' united Greeks, The feasts of kings, do from this gift proceed, Since first the vine, with hoary bunches laden, Push'd from beneath the ground its fertile shoots, Clasping the poplar in its firm embrace, And from its buds burst forth a numerous race,