that many of the best people in India who are strict in their
religion and drink no wine at all, "use a liquor more wholesome than
pleasant, they call coffee; made by a black Seed boyld in water, which
turnes it almost into the same colour, but doth very little alter the
taste of the water [!], notwithstanding it is very good to help
Digestion, to quicken the Spirits and to cleanse the Blood."

[Illustration#: FIRST PRINTED REFERENCE TO COFFEE IN ENGLISH, 1598

It appears as _Chaona_ (_chaoua_) in the second line of the roman text
notation by Paludanus]

In 1623, Francis Bacon (1561-1626), in his _Historia Vitae et Mortis_
says: "The Turkes use a kind of herb which they call _caphe_"; and, in
1624, in his _Sylva Sylvarum_[53] (published in 1627, after his death),
he writes:

They have in Turkey a drink called _coffa_ made of a berry of the
same name, as black as soot, and of a strong scent, but not
aromatical; which they take, beaten into powder, in water, as hot
as they can drink it: and they take it, and sit at it in their
coffa-houses, which are like our taverns. This drink comforteth the
brain and heart, and helpeth digestion. Certainly this berry coffa,
the root and leaf betel, the leaf tobacco, and the tear of poppy
(opium) of which the Turks are great takers (supposing it expelleth
all fear), do all condense the spirits, and make them strong and
aleger. But it seemeth they were taken after several manners; for
coffa and opium are taken down, tobacco but in smoke, and betel is
but champed in the mouth with a little lime.

Robert Burton (1577-1640), English philosopher and humorist, in his
_Anatomy of Melancholy_[54] writes in 1632:

The Turkes have a drinke called coffa (for they use no wine), so
named of a berry as blacke as soot and as bitter (like that blacke
drinke which was in use amongst the Lacedemonians and perhaps the
same), which they sip still of, and sup as warme as they can
suffer; they spend much time in those coffa-houses, which are
somewhat like our Ale-houses or Taverns, and there they sit,
chatting and drinking, to drive away the time, and to be merry
together, because they find, by experience, that kinde of drinke so
used, helpeth digestion and procureth alacrity.

Later English scholars, however, found sufficient evidence in the works
of Arabian authors to assure their readers that c