A double discrimination is here made in favor of malt liquors, viz., one in explicit terms, permitting the sale of strong beer only, and an implied one in the clause which excludes debts for wines and strong waters (not for beer) from the list of obligations legally pleadable. The fact is that beer was considered an indispensable part of every regular meal. Among the “staple commodities” sought to be encouraged by law, in 1658, we find hops and wine; the premium on the latter being ten thousands pounds of tobacco for “two tunne of wine” raised in any colonial vineyard. The importation of English malt and malt liquors increased rapidly, because domestic brewing and malting remained in an unsatisfactory condition. Roger Beverly gives the following interesting description of the manufacture and use of drinks at about this time: “The richer sort generally brew their small beer with malt, which they have from England, though they have as good barley of their own as any in the world; but for want of the convenience of malt-houses, the inhabitants take no care to sow it. The poorer sort brew their beer with molasses and bran; with Indian corn malted by drying in a stove; with persimmons dried in cakes, and baked; with potatoes; with the green stalks of Indian corn cut small and bruised; with pompions; and with the _batates canadenses_, or _jerusalem artichoke_, which some people plant purposely for that use, but this is the least esteem’d of all the sorts before mentioned. “Their strong drink is _Madeira_ wine, which is a noble strong wine; and punch, made either of rum from the _Caribbee_ Island, or brandy distilled from their apples, and peaches; besides _French brandy_, wine and strong beer, which they have continually from England.” In 1748, the Sabbath question first entered into legislation on the liquor traffic. No mention is made of the subject in any of the preceding acts, not even in those passed during the Cromwellian reign, when the Puritan idea, that the State should by legislative enactment enforce complete inactivity and abandonment to spiritual contemplation on Sunday, had gained popular favor. The act passed in that year contained the following clauses referring to the Sabbath: ... “If any ordinary-keeper shall in his house permit unlawful gaming, or suffer any person or persons to tipple in his house, or drink any more than is necessary, on the Lord’s day, or any other day set apart by public authority for religious worship, ... the court may disable such offender from keeping ordinary thereafter, until they shall think fit to grant him a new license, or may restore him to keep ordinary upon his former license, as they shall see cause.”