Note 1278 — Chapter VI · INDUSTRY: OIL AND COLOUR MEN.—ITALIAN WAREHOUSES.—DRUGGISTS.—COLLECTORS OF SIMPLES.

Odyss. δ. 221. Plin. Nat. Hist. xxi. 21. Dutens, p. 183. From a passage in Herodotus there seems reason to suspect, that certain Asiatic nations were already in his time acquainted with the inebriating effects of opium smoke. For, describing the inhabitants of the larger islands found in the Araxes, he relates that they were accustomed to gather together round a fire, and casting the fruit of some unknown tree into the flames to inhale with delight the smoke and effluvia emitted by it, until they experienced all the delight and madness of intoxication, which impelled them to leap about, and dance and sing. i. 202. Among the Scythians, moreover, we find in the same author distinct traces of the use of beng, or hemp-seed. iv. 75.