That has become the general motto. It sounds very filthy to hear of the astounding quantities of liquor consumed. But, in the first place, where much is drunk, it is only very light stuff. And, to make it less trying, the drinkers adopt the Socratic maxim of "small cups and many," by frothing the beer up incredibly. Altogether they follow good classical rules, which it is curious to trace, and which make their symposia rather interesting. Drinking is not the end, but only the natural means for attaining hilarity. And there is a good deal of rough geniality about it. Like the ancient Greeks, these organised drinkers fix a well-recognised [Greek: tropos tês poseôs]. They have their absolute ruler, the symposiarch, their accepted order of drinking, their proper scale of fines. And also, as in Greece, only too often drinking is not a voluntary act, but [Greek: anagkazesthai], and it is made to be [Greek: apneusti pinein]--drinking without taking breath. There is the [Greek: propinein philotêsias]--drinking to one another--which _must_ be answered. There are songs and jokes--though no _tæniæ_ and, fortunately, no kisses. And the small cups are duly followed up with the large horns, the [Greek: kerata], and the huge vessels which the Greeks called [Greek: phreata]. Nay, these modern classics even imitate the Greeks in respect of the [Greek: hales kai kyminon]. For in many places the well-salted and carawayed [Greek: epipasta] forms a standing accompaniment to the liquor. And next day, if they are a trifle "foxed," they copy the Greeks in [Greek: kraipalên kraipalê exelaunein], or, as Sir John Linger calls it in better "understanded" language, they take "a hair of the same dog," with a pickled herring covered with raw onions for a companion, which is supposed to set all things right. There are beer-courts to adjudge upon disputes, there are indeterminate beer-minutes to settle the time--everything is "beer." In all this joking there is no harm. As little harm is _meant_ to be in the _missoe cerevisiales_ which tradition has handed down from the time when monks were both the greatest brewers and also the greatest drinkers, and, probably, in their refectories and misericords made as much fun of the service over their cups as do now--or did until lately--German students. There is the genuine chanting of versicles and responses, but the words have reference to beer. This practice, I am glad to say, is now very much on the decline.