This pioneering study of psychoactive plants and their role in society, initially published in 1855, is one of the first books to examine the cultivation, preparation, and consumption of the world's major stimulants and inebriants. It presents a fascinating panorama of the world-wide use of psychoactive plants in the nineteenth century. He devotes a full chapter to each of 17 plants, ranging from coffee and tea, through tobacco and hashish, to powerful narcotics and hallucinogens such as opium and fly agaric. Witty, engaging, and intellectually open.