This “Announcement,” although to us it seems somewhat vague it its wording, very clearly proclaims certain facts. That drunkenness had taken such a hold upon the people as to threaten the ruin of the empire of China more than one thousand years B.C.; that the chief ruler feared to deal with nobles and ministers of state as with the common people (“one law for the rich and another for the poor”); that the punishment of death was at least threatened in the attempt to enforce sobriety; that total abstinence was not deemed to come within the province of legislative enactment; and that it was proper to use strong drink in religious ceremonies.[34] But we may learn far more than this from the ancient records. The “Book of Poetry” (“She-King”) gives us some very interesting details of the domestic, social, and religious life of the period, and we shall have no difficulty in transporting ourselves back three thousand years or more, and of witnessing in imagination the gatherings which are so graphically delineated. The popular drink appears to have been “spirits” prepared from rice and strained, as we shall find from the poems of which extracts follow, and these spirits were drunk on all occasions. The religious festivals seem to have been accompanied, as some are even in our day, by social entertainments; and the drinking-songs and pastorals show that although temperance was esteemed a virtue, it was one which was not always practised on those occasions. The two following verses are extracts from an ode descriptive of life in the land of Pin in the olden time; the date is uncertain, but it was probably more than eleven hundred years B.C.[35] “For food, the sixth month, plums and vines they spoil; The seventh, the beans and sunflower seeds they boil; The eighth, they strike the jujube dates all down; The tenth, they reap the paddy fully grown, And with the grain make spirits ’gainst the spring, Which to the bushy eyebrows comfort bring. ... In the ninth month, the cold begins with frost: The tenth, their cornyards swept and clean they boast. Good spirits in two vessels kept they take To help their joy, and this proposal make:— ‘Well kill both lambs and sheep,’ they joyous say, ‘And to the Ruler’s quickly take our way. We’ll mount his hall; the massive cup we’ll raise Made of rhinoceros’ horn; and as we praise, Wish him long life,—the life of endless days.’” Thus it would appear that, after completing their harvest and sweeping their cornyards clean, those ancient people went to greet their rulers, as shown in the preceding verses, and they also offered sacrifices to the gods. Those customs are well described in verse:— “Now, when our barns are filled with grain, And myriad stacks in field remain, Spirits and viands we prepare To use on grand occasions rare, In sacrificial rite.”[36] And when they go before their ruler they sing thus:[37]—