“The exciting agent, whatever it might be, was certainly as quick in its operation and as effective in its results as any ‘tanglefoot’ or ‘bottled lightning’ known to modern civilization.
“Upon inquiry, we learned to our astonishment that they had been eating a species of the plant vulgarly known as ‘toadstool.’ There is a peculiar fungus of this class in Siberia, known to the natives as ‘muk-a-moor,’ and as it possesses active intoxicating properties, it is used as a stimulant by nearly all the Siberian tribes.
“Taken in large doses, it is a violent narcotic poison, but in small doses it produces all the effects of alcoholic liquor.
“Its habitual use, however, completely shatters the nervous system, and its sale by Russian traders to the natives has consequently been made a penal offence by the Russian law. In spite of all prohibitions the trade is still secretly carried on, and I have seen twenty dollars’ worth of furs bought with a single fungus.
“The Koraks would gather it for themselves, but it requires the shelter of timber for its growth, and is not to be found on the barren steppes over which they wander; so that they are obliged for the most part to buy it at enormous prices from the Russian traders. It may sound strangely to American ears, but the invitation which a convivial Korak extends to his passing friend is not ‘Come in and have a drink,’ but ‘Won’t you come in and take a toadstool?’—not a very alluring proposal perhaps to a civilized toper, but one which has a magical effect upon a dissipated Korak. As the supply of these toadstools is by no means equal to the demand, Korak ingenuity has been greatly exercised in the endeavor to economize the precious stimulant and make it go as far as possible.
“Sometimes in the course of human events it becomes imperatively necessary that a whole band should get drunk together, and they have only one toadstool to do it with. For a description of the manner in which this band gets drunk collectively and individually upon one fungus, and keeps drunk for a week, the curious reader is referred to Goldsmith’s ‘A Citizen of the World,’ Letter 32.
“It is but just to say, however, that this horrible practice is almost entirely confined to the settled Koraks of Penzshink Gulf,—the lowest, most degraded portion of the whole tribe. It may prevail to a limited extent among the wandering natives, but I never heard of more than one such instance outside the Penzshink Gulf settlements.”—(“Tent Life in Siberia,” George Kennan, New York and London, 1887, pp. 202-204.)
Oliver Goldsmith speaks of “a curious custom” among “the Tartars of Koraki.... The Russians who trade with them carry thither a kind of mushroom.... These mushrooms the rich Tartars lay up in large quantities for the winter; and when a nobleman makes a mushroom feast all the neighbors around are invited. The mushrooms are prepared by boiling, by which the water acquires an intoxicating quality, and is a sort of drink which the Tartars prize beyond all other. When the nobility and ladies are assembled, and the ceremonies usual between people of distinction over, the mushroom broth goes freely round, and they laugh, talk double-entendres, grow fuddled, and become excellent company. The poorer sort, who love mushroom broth to distraction as well as the rich, but cannot afford it at first hand, post themselves on these occasions round the huts of the rich, and watch the opportunity of the ladies and gentlemen as they come down to pass their liquor, and holding a wooden bowl, catch the delicious fluid, very little altered by filtration, being still strongly tinctured with the intoxicating quality. Of this they drink with the utmost satisfaction, and thus they get as drunk and as jovial as their betters.
“‘Happy nobility!’ cried my companion, ‘who can fear no diminution of respect unless seized with strangury, and who when drunk are most useful! Though we have not this custom among us, I foresee that if it were introduced, we might have many a toad-eater in England ready to drink from the wooden bowl on these occasions, and to praise the flavor of his lordship’s liquor. As we have different classes of gentry, who knows but we may see a lord holding the bowl to the minister, a knight holding it to his lordship, and a simple squire drinking it double-distilled from the loins of knighthood?’”—(Oliver Goldsmith, “Letters from a Citizen of the World,” No. 32. This is based upon Philip Van Stralenburgh’s “Histori-Geographical Description of the North and Eastern Part of Europe and Asia,” London, 1736, p. 397.)