The earliest record we have of wine is in the Book of Genesis, where we are told, "Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vineyard," from which it is evident he knew the use that might be made of the fruit by pressing the juice from it and preserving it: he was, however, deceived in its strength by its sweetness; for, we are told, "he drank of the wine, and was drunken." When the offspring of Noah dispersed into the different countries of the world, they carried the vine with them, and taught the use which might be made of it. Asia was the first country to which the gift was imparted; and thence it quickly spread to Europe and Africa, as we learn from the Iliad of Homer; from which book we also learn that, at the time of the Trojan war, part of the commerce consisted in the freight of wines. In order to arrive at customs and historical evidence less remote, we must take refuge, as historians have done before us, in the inner life of the two great empires of Greece and Rome, among whom we find the ceremonies attached to drinking were by no means sparse; and as the Romans copied most of their social manners from the Greeks, the formalities observed among the two nations in drinking differ but little. In public assemblies the wine-cup was never raised to the lips without previously invoking a blessing from a supposed good deity, from which custom it is probable that the grace-cup of later days took its origin; and at the conclusion of their feast, a cup was quaffed to their good genius, termed "poculum boni Dei," which corresponds in the present day with the "coup d'étrier" of the French, the "dock un dorish" of the Highland Scotch, and the "parting-pot" of our own country. The Romans also frequently drank the healths of their Emperors; and among other toasts they seldom forgot "absent friends," though we have no record of their drinking to "all friends round St. Peter's." It was customary at their entertainments to elect, by throwing the dice, a person termed "arbiter bibendi," to act much in the same way as our modern toast-master, his business being to lay down to the company the rules to be observed in drinking, with the power to punish such as did not conform to them. The gods having been propitiated, the master of the feast drank his first cup to the most distinguished guest, and then handed a full cup to him, in which he acknowledged the compliment; the cup was then passed round by the company, invariably from left to right, and always presented with the right hand: on some occasions each person had his own cup, which a servant replenished as soon as it was emptied, as described in the feast of Homer's heroes. The vessels from which they drank were generally made of wood, decorated with gold and silver, and crowned with garlands, as also were their heads, particular flowers and herbs being selected, which were supposed to keep all noxious vapours from the brain. In some cases their cups were formed entirely of gold,