Notwithstanding these severe penalties and denunciations, however, it is clear from the later Sanskrit literature that intoxication was still rife amongst the Aryan races of India. Palastya, an ancient sage, enumerates no less than twelve different kinds of liquor besides soma,[72] and the preparation of those drinks from the grape, from honey, sugar, dates, the palm, pepper, rice, cocoa-nut, &c., has been described with considerable minuteness. Besides these home-made drinks, large quantities of foreign wines were imported into India two thousand years ago, and met with a ready sale throughout the country. Amongst them are mentioned the wine of Laodicea in Syria, Italian and Arabian wines. In later times attempts were made by various rulers to suppress the manufacture and use of intoxicating drinks, but in the sixteenth century, when the interior of India was visited by English adventurers, many kinds were freely consumed, and they are said to have been drunk out of vessels of the most costly description. The East India Company encouraged the distillation of spirits as a means of revenue, and the best proof of the extensive consumption of such drinks in India during the last and beginning of the present century is to be found in the published statistics of the Company. Large quantities of native arrack, besides brandy, rum, gin, wine, and ale, were imported and exported from the various districts, and although the English themselves were, doubtless, large consumers, the quantities named suffice to show that these drinks must have been in general use amongst all classes.[73] In the year 1833 the value of native arrack exported from Ceylon alone to Great Britain and the British Colonies was £12,425, 9s., besides which large quantities were sent annually for consumption in Madras, Bombay, and other parts of India.[74]