In milk-beer, milk is substituted for water. _Kef_ is a kind of effervescing fermented milk, much resembling _Koumiss_ (or rather _Kumyss_), of which the best is probably to be obtained in Samàra. _Youourt_[167] is a favourite drink at Constantinople, made of milk curdled after a peculiar fashion. _Syra_, a form allied with the German _Säure_, is a sour whey, used for drink like small beer in Norway and Iceland. _Aizen_ and _Leban_ are both sorts of _Kumyss_, one of the Tartars, the other of the Arabs. The latter have also an intoxicating liquor _Sabzi_, made of _Bhang_, a species of hemp. The green leaf from which the drink derives its name is pounded and diluted with sugared water. Even the warm blood of living animals has been considered suitable for a drink. In the book of Ser Marco Polo the Venetian, concerning the marvels of the East, we are told, the Tartar will sustain himself in an economical manner, by opening a vein in the neck of the horse upon which he rides, and having taken a sufficient drink will close the aperture, and ride on as before. Carpini says much the same of the Mongols. This appears indeed to have been a time-honoured institution. Dionysius Periegetes, in the nineteenth chapter of his _Description of the World_, treating of Scythia and other ancient nations situated in what is now known as Great Tartary, says of the Massagetæ that they have no eating of bread nor any native wine, but ἵππων Αἵματι μίσγοντες λευκὸν γάλα δαῖτα τίθεντο. “Or with horses blood, And white milk mingled set their banquets forth,” _Orbis Desc._, 578. And Sidonius, to the same effect, “_solitosque cruentum_ _Lac potare Getas, et pocula tingere venas._” _Parag. ad Avitum._ Another strange variety of drink is made by the Peruvians. The ordinary _chica_ is mixed with the bloody garments of a slain warrior. Temple (_Travels_, ii., 311). According to Lobo, the Abyssinians esteem the gall one of the most delicious parts of a beast, and drink glasses of it, as epicures with us drink _Château Lafitte_. Pearce (_Adventures in Abyssinia_, i., 95) says that they also drink blood warm from the animal with an extraordinary relish. The Mantchoos, the conquerors of China, prepare a wine of a peculiar mixture from the flesh of lambs, either by fermenting it reduced to a kind of paste with the milk of their domestic animals, or by bruising it to a pulp with rice. When properly matured, it is put into jars and drawn as occasion requires. It is said to be strong and nutritious, and the most voluptuous orgies of the Tartars are the result of an intoxication from _lamb wine_. Abbé Rickard, _History of Tonquin_.