Herodotus informs us that the Scythians cultivated hemp, and converted it into linen cloth, resembling that made from flax; and he adds also, that “when, therefore, the Scythians have taken some seed of this hemp, they creep under the cloths, and then put the seed on the red hot stones; but this being put on smokes, and produces such a steam, that no Grecian vapour-bath would surpass it. The Scythians, transported with the vapour, shout aloud.”[3] The same author also states that the Massagetæ, dwelling on an island of the Araxes, have discovered “trees that produce fruit of a peculiar kind, which the inhabitants, when they meet together in companies, and have lit a fire, throw on the fire as they sit round in a circle; and that by inhaling the fumes of the burning fruit that has been thrown on, they become intoxicated by the odour, just as the Greeks do by wine, and that the more fruit is thrown on, the more intoxicated they become, until they rise up to dance, and betake themselves to singing.”[4] Homer also makes Helen administer to Telemachus, in the house of Menelaus, a potion prepared from _nepenthes_, which made him forget his sorrows. “Meanwhile with genial joy to warm the soul, Bright Helen mix’d a mirth-inspiring bowl; Temper’d with drugs of sovereign use to assuage The boiling bosom of tumultuous rage; To clear the cloudy front of wrinkled care, And dry the tearful sluices of despair; Charm’d with that virtuous draught, the exalted mind All sense of woe delivers to the wind: Though on the blazing pile his parent lay, Or a loved brother groan’d his life away, Or darling son, oppress’d by ruffian force, Fell breathless at its feet a mangled corse; From morn to eve, impassive and serene The man entranced would view the deathful scene. These drugs, so friendly to the joys of life, Bright Helen learn’d from Thone’s imperial wife, Who sway’d the sceptre where prolific Nile With various simples clothes the fatten’d soil. With wholesome herbage mixed, the direful bane Of vegetable venom taints the plain; From Pæon sprung, their patron-god imparts To all the Pharian race his healing arts.” POPE’S _Homer’s Odyssey_, b. iv.