When He Has More Than One Wife, She With Whom He Slept The Night
Before Sits Beside Him That Day, And All The Other Wives Must Come To Her
House That Day To Drink; And All The Gifts Which The Lord Receives That Day
Are Deposited In Her Chests.
Upon a bench there stands vessels of milk and
other drinks, and drinking cups.
SECTION IV.
Of their Kinds of Drink, and Fashion of Drinking.
In winter they make excellent drink of rice, millet, and honey, which is
clear like wine; and they have wine brought to them from distant countries.
In summer they care not for any drink except cosmos, which always stands
within the door, and beside it is a minstrel with his instrument of music.
I saw no citerns, lutes, and viols, such as ours, but they have many other
instruments which we have not. When the lord begins to drink, one of his
servants exclaims aloud Ha! and the minstrel begins to play. When they make
a great feast, all the guests clap their hands and dance to the music, the
men before the lord, and the women before the lady of the house. When the
lord hath drank, the servant calls out as before, and the minstrel ceases;
then all drink round in their turns, both men and women, and they sometimes
carouse on hearing the news of a victory, to a shameful and beastly degree.
When they desire to provoke one to drink, they seize him by the ears,
dragging them strongly, as if to widen his throat, clapping their hands,
and dancing before him.
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