Without, therefore, attempting to dogmatise on a question of such extended application, and one which presents such varying aspects, as the instinct for drink and the prevalence of drunkenness amongst savage peoples, it is safe to affirm, first, that wherever and from whatever source any intoxicating beverage has been obtainable, the untutored races have not been slow to discover its use. Secondly, that when civilised men have introduced a stronger drink than that already possessed by the natives, it has been in the majority of cases readily consumed by them, and that the further they were removed from the moderating influence of civilisation the more uncontrolled has been the passion for drink and the greater its indulgence. And now, before proceeding to investigate the facts of history and tradition concerning the employment of intoxicating drinks by the nations of the world, let us endeavour to ascertain where the earliest traces are to be found of the existence of those natural productions which have been used in their preparation. The palm-tree, of course, existed in the tropical regions probably long before man appeared upon the scene, and that its sap was employed for the manufacture of wine between five hundred and six hundred years before Christ, we know from the pages of Herodotus,[17] but that is comparatively recent. Of the employment of barley and other cereals for intoxicating beverages in remote ages of the past we have also abundant evidence, to which reference will be made hereafter. The origin of the vine, or rather its first application to drinking purposes, is a much-debated question. The Romans and Greeks believed Dionysus (Bacchus) to have employed it first for wine-making. Representations of vineyards with grape-gatherers and wine-presses are to be found on the monuments of ancient Egypt; whilst in the Hebrew scriptures Noah is the first man mentioned as having cultivated the grape. These circumstances will be touched upon when we come to deal with the drinking customs of the various nations to whom they relate, but they are only named here to show that the grape and such cereals as barley were employed at a very early age for the preparation of inebriating drinks, for we are in possession of facts which fix the period when these materials were known and in use long prior to that indicated even by tradition.