The most common form of using alcohol in this country is that of Beer.

Ale has been for centuries the national beverage of the English. The "mead" of the Saxons appears to have early merged into it, as it is mentioned by Chaucer; and in his time, and afterwards, its praises were sung in popular songs and Christmas choruses. But the "good ale" of Bishop Still's famous song was not the ale of to-day. It was made of malt it is true, and resembled our ale in being an alcoholic liquor; but to the malt, unmalted oats were added, and the bitter flavour was given by the addition of ivy-berries, or bay-berries. An attempt was made in 1428 to flavour ale with hops, but the people, always averse to novelty, petitioned Parliament against it as a "wicked weed," and the use of them was deferred till 1528, when, as the old rhyme tells us - "-----, Reformation, and beer,*

Came into England in the same year".

It appears likely that hops were not indigenous to Britain, but were introduced from the Hanse Towns, where they were used for the beer which formed one of the staple exports of those boroughs in the thirteenth century;

* Ale made with hops.

An Imperial pint of the Beers named contains the following ingredients: -