A

TREATISE

ON

ADULTERATIONS OF FOOD, _AND CULINARY POISONS_. 

EXHIBITING

The Fraudulent Sophistications of

BREAD, BEER, WINE, SPIRITOUS LIQUORS, TEA, COFFEE, CREAM, CONFECTIONERY, VINEGAR, MUSTARD, PEPPER, CHEESE, OLIVE OIL, PICKLES, AND OTHER ARTICLES EMPLOYED IN DOMESTIC ECONOMY. 

AND

METHODS OF DETECTING THEM. 

_By Fredrick Accum_, OPERATIVE CHEMIST, AND MEMBER OF THE PRINCIPAL ACADEMIES AND SOCIETIESOF ARTS AND SCIENCES IN EUROPE. 

Philadelphia:PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY AB'M SMALL1820. 

PREFACE. 

This Treatise, as its title expresses, is intended to exhibit easymethods of detecting the fraudulent adulterations of food, and of otherarticles, classed either among the necessaries or luxuries of the table;and to put the unwary on their guard against the use of such commoditiesas are contaminated with substances deleterious to health. 

Every person is aware that bread, beer, wine, and other substancesemployed in domestic economy, are frequently met with in an adulteratedstate: and the late convictions of numerous individuals forcounterfeiting and adulterating tea, coffee, bread, beer, pepper, andother articles of diet, are still fresh in the memory of the public. 

To such perfection of ingenuity has the system of counterfeiting andadulterating various commodities of life arrived in this country, thatspurious articles are every where to be found in the market, made up soskilfully, as to elude the discrimination of the most experiencedjudges. 

But of all possible nefarious traffic and deception, practised bymercenary dealers, that of adulterating the articles intended for humanfood with ingredients deleterious to health, is the most criminal, and, in the mind of every honest man, must excite feelings of regret anddisgust. Numerous facts are on record, of human food, contaminated withpoisonous ingredients, having been vended to the public; and the annalsof medicine record tragical events ensuing from the use of such food. 

The eager and insatiable thirst for gain, is proof against prohibitionsand penalties; and the possible sacrifice of a fellow-creature's life, is a secondary consideration among unprincipled dealers. 

However invidious the office may appear, and however painful the dutymay be, of exposing the names of individuals, who have been convicted ofadulterating food; yet it was necessary, for the verification of mystatement, that cases should be adduced in their support; and I havecarefully avoided citing any, except those which are authenticated inParliamentary documents and other public records. 

To render this Treatise still more useful, I have also animadverted oncertain material errors, sometimes unconsciously committed throughaccident or ignorance, in private families, during the preparation ofvarious articles of food, and of delicacies for the table. 

In stating the experimental proceedings necessary for the detection ofthe frauds which it has been my object to expose, I have confined myselfto the task of pointing out such operations only as may be performed bypersons unacquainted with chemical science; and it has been my purposeto express all necessary rules and instructions in the plainestlanguage, divested of those recondite terms of science, which would beout of place in a work intended for general perusal. 

The design of the Treatise will be fully answered, if the views heregiven should induce a single reader to pursue the object for which itis published; or if it should tend to impress on the mind of the Publicthe magnitude of an evil, which, in many cases, prevails to an extent soalarming, that we may exclaim with the sons of the Prophet, "_THERE IS DEATH IN THE POT. _"

For the abolition of such nefarious practices, it is the interest of allclasses of the community to co-operate. 

FREDRICK ACCUM. 

LONDON. 1820. 

CONTENTS. 

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS ON THE ADULTERATION OF FOOD _Page_ 13

EFFECT OF DIFFERENT KINDS OF WATER EMPLOYED IN DOMESTIC ECONOMY 33

_Characters of Good Water_ 37

_Chemical Constitution of the Waters used in Domestic Economy andthe Arts_ 40

_Rain Water_ 40_Snow Water_ 41_Spring Water_ 42_River Water_ 44

_Substances usually contained in Common Water, and Tests by whichthey are detected_ 48

_Method of ascertaining the Quantity of each of the differentSubstances usually contained in Common Water_ 54

_Deleterious Effects of keeping Water for Domestic Economy, inLeaden Reservoirs_ 60

_Method of detecting Lead, when contained in common Water_ 69

ADULTERATION OF WINE 74

_Method of detecting the Deleterious Adulterations of Wine_ 86

_Specific Differences, and Component Parts of Wine_ 89

_Easy process of ascertaining the Quantity of Brandy contained invarious sorts of Wine_ 92

_Tabular View, exhibiting the Per Centage of Brandy or Alcoholcontained in various kinds of Wine and other fermented Liquors_ 94

_Constitution of Home-made Wines_ 96

ADULTERATION OF BREAD 98

_Method of detecting the Presence of Alum in Bread_ 108

_Easy Method of judging of the Goodness of Bread-Corn andBread-Flour_ 110

ADULTERATION OF BEER 113

_List of Druggists and Grocers, prosecuted and convicted forsupplying illegal Ingredients to Brewers for Adulterating Beer_ 119

_Porter_ 121

_Strength and Specific Differences of different kinds of Porter_ 125

_List of Publicans prosecuted and convicted for adulterating Beerwith illegal Ingredients, and for mixing Table Beer with theirStrong Beer_ 129

_Illegal Substances used for adulterating Beer_ 131

_Ingredients seized at various Breweries and Brewers' Druggists, for adulterating Beer_ 136

_List of Brewers prosecuted and convicted for adulterating StrongBeer with Table Beer_ 143

_Old, or Entire Beer; and New or Mild Beer_ 144

_List of Brewers prosecuted and convicted for receiving and usingillegal Ingredients in their Brewings_ 151

_Method of detecting the Adulteration of Beer_ 158

_Method of ascertaining the Quantity of Spirit contained in Porter, Ale, &c. _ 160

_Per Centage of Alcohol contained in Porter, and other kinds ofMalt Liquors_ 162

COUNTERFEIT TEA-LEAVES 163

_Methods of detecting the Adulterations of Tea-Leaves_ 171

COUNTERFEIT COFFEE 176

ADULTERATION OF BRANDY, RUM, AND GIN 187

_Method of detecting the Adulterations of Brandy, Rum, and MaltSpirit_ 195

_Method of detecting the Presence of Lead in Spiritous Liquors_ 202

_Method of ascertaining the Quantity of Alcohol contained indifferent kinds of Spiritous Liquors_ 203

_Table exhibiting the Per Centage of Alcohol contained in variouskinds of Spiritous Liquors_ 205

POISONOUS CHEESE, _and method of detecting it_ 206

COUNTERFEIT PEPPER, _and Method of detecting it_ 211

_White Pepper, and method of manufacturing it_ 213

POISONOUS CAYENNE PEPPER, _and method of detecting it_ 215

POISONOUS PICKLES, _and method of detecting them_ 217

ADULTERATION OF VINEGAR, _and method of detecting it_ 220

_Distilled Vinegar_ 221

ADULTERATION OF CREAM, _and method of detecting it_ 222

POISONOUS CONFECTIONERY, _and method of detecting it_ 224

POISONOUS CATSUP, _and method of detecting it_ 227

POISONOUS CUSTARDS 231

POISONOUS ANCHOVY SAUCE, _and method of detecting it_ 234

ADULTERATION OF LOZENGES, _and method of detecting them_ 236

POISONOUS OLIVE OIL, _and method of detecting it_ 239

ADULTERATION OF MUSTARD 241

ADULTERATION OF LEMON ACID, _and method of detecting it_ 243

POISONOUS MUSHROOMS 246

_Mushroom catsup_ 250

POISONOUS SODA WATER, _and method of detecting it_ 251

FOOD POISONED BY COPPER VESSELS, _and method of detecting it_ 252

FOOD POISONED BY LEADEN VESSELS, _and method of detecting it_ 257

INDEX 261

A

TREATISE

ON

ADULTERATIONS OF FOOD, AND

CULINARY POISONS. 

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS. 

Of all the frauds practised by mercenary dealers, there is none morereprehensible, and at the same time more prevalent, than thesophistication of the various articles of food. 

This unprincipled and nefarious practice, increasing in degree as it hasbeen found difficult of detection, is now applied to almost everycommodity which can be classed among either the necessaries or theluxuries of life, and is carried on to a most alarming extent in everypart of the United Kingdom. 

It has been pursued by men, who, from the magnitude and apparentrespectability of their concerns, would be the least obnoxious to publicsuspicion; and their successful example has called forth, from among theretail dealers, a multitude of competitors in the same iniquitouscourse. 

To such perfection of ingenuity has this system of adulterating foodarrived, that spurious articles of various kinds are every where to befound, made up so skilfully as to baffle the discrimination of the mostexperienced judges. 

Among the number of substances used in domestic economy which are nowvery generally found sophisticated, may be distinguished--tea, coffee, bread, beer, wine, spiritous liquors, salad oil, pepper, vinegar, mustard, cream, and other articles of subsistence. 

Indeed, it would be difficult to mention a single article of food whichis not to be met with in an adulterated state; and there are somesubstances which are scarcely ever to be procured genuine. 

Some of these spurious compounds are comparatively harmless when usedas food; and as in these cases merely substances of inferior value aresubstituted for more costly and genuine ingredients, the sophistication, though it may affect our purse, does not injure our health. Of this kindare the manufacture of factitious pepper, the adulterations of mustard, vinegar, cream, &c. Others, however, are highly deleterious; and to thisclass belong the adulterations of beer, wines, spiritous liquors, pickles, salad oil, and many others. 

There are particular chemists who make it a regular trade to supplydrugs or nefarious preparations to the unprincipled brewer of porter orale; others perform the same office to the wine and spirit merchant; andothers again to the grocer and the oilman. The operators carry on theirprocesses chiefly in secresy, and under some delusive firm, with theostensible denotements of a fair and lawful establishment. 

These illicit pursuits have assumed all the order and method of aregular trade; they may severally claim to be distinguished as an _artand mystery_; for the workmen employed in them are often wholly ignorantof the nature of the substances which pass through their hands, and ofthe purposes to which they are ultimately applied. 

To elude the vigilance of the inquisitive, to defeat the scrutiny of therevenue officer, and to ensure the secresy of these mysteries, theprocesses are very ingeniously divided and subdivided among individualoperators, and the manufacture is purposely carried on in separateestablishments. The task of proportioning the ingredients for use isassigned to one individual, while the composition and preparation ofthem may be said to form a distinct part of the business, and isentrusted to another workman. Most of the articles are transmitted tothe consumer in a disguised state, or in such a form that their realnature cannot possibly be detected by the unwary. Thus the extract of_coculus indicus_, employed by fraudulent manufacturers of malt-liquorsto impart an intoxicating quality to porter or ales, is known in themarket by the name of _black extract_, ostensibly destined for the useof tanners and dyers. It is obtained by boiling the berries of thecoculus indicus in water, and converting, by a subsequent evaporation, this decoction into a stiff black tenacious mass, possessing, in a highdegree, the narcotic and intoxicating quality of the poisonous berryfrom which it is prepared. Another substance, composed of extract ofquassia and liquorice juice, used by fraudulent brewers to economiseboth malt and hops, is technically called _multum_. [1]

The quantities of coculus indicus berries, as well as of black extract, imported into this country for adulterating malt liquors, are enormous. It forms a considerable branch of commerce in the hands of a fewbrokers: yet, singular as it may seem, no inquiry appears to have beenhitherto made by the officers of the revenue respecting its application. Many other substances employed in the adulteration of beer, ale, andspiritous liquors, are in a similar manner intentionally disguised; andof the persons by whom they are purchased, a great number are totallyunacquainted with their nature or composition. 

An extract, said to be innocent, sold in casks, containing from half acwt. To five cwt. By the brewers' druggists, under the name of_bittern_, is composed of calcined sulphate of iron (copperas), extractof coculus indicus berries, extract of quassia, and Spanish liquorice. 

It would be very easy to adduce, in support of these remarks, thetestimony of numerous individuals, by whom I have been professionallyengaged to examine certain mixtures, said to be perfectly innocent, which are used in very extensive manufactories of the above description. Indeed, during the long period devoted to the practice of myprofession, I have had abundant reason to be convinced that a vastnumber of dealers, of the highest respectability, have vended to theircustomers articles absolutely poisonous, which they themselvesconsidered as harmless, and which they would not have offered for sale, had they been apprised of the spurious and pernicious nature of thecompounds, and of the purposes to which they were destined. 

For instance, I have known cases in which brandy merchants were notaware that the substance which they frequently purchase under thedelusive name of _flash_, for strengthening and clarifying spiritousliquors, and which is held out as consisting of burnt sugar andisinglass only, in the form of an extract, is in reality a compound ofsugar, with extract of capsicum; and that to the acrid and pungentqualities of the capsicum is to be ascribed the heightened flavour ofbrandy and rum, when coloured with the above-mentioned matter. 

In other cases the ale-brewer has been supplied with ready-groundcoriander seeds, previously mixed with a portion of _nux vomica_ andquassia, to give a bitter taste and narcotic property to the beverage. 

The retail venders of mustard do not appear to be aware that mustardseed alone cannot produce, when ground, a powder of so intense andbrilliant a colour as that of the common mustard of commerce. Nor wouldthe powder of real mustard, when mixed with salt and water, without theaddition of a portion of pulverised capsicum, keep for so long a time asthe mustard usually offered for sale. 

Many other instances of unconscious deceptions might be mentioned, whichwere practised by persons of upright and honourable minds. 

It is a painful reflection, that the division of labour which has beenso instrumental in bringing the manufactures of this country to theirpresent flourishing state, should have also tended to conceal andfacilitate the fraudulent practices in question; and that from acorrespondent ramification of commerce into a multitude of distinctbranches, particularly in the metropolis and the large towns of theempire, the traffic in adulterated commodities should find its waythrough so many circuitous channels, as to defy the most scrutinisingendeavour to trace it to its source. 

It is not less lamentable that the extensive application of chemistry tothe useful purposes of life, should have been perverted into anauxiliary to this nefarious traffic. But, happily for the science, itmay, without difficulty, be converted into a means of detecting theabuse; to effect which, very little chemical skill is required; and thecourse to be pursued forms the object of the following pages. 

The baker asserts that he does not put alum into bread; but he is wellaware that, in purchasing a certain quantity of flour, he must take asack of _sharp whites_ (a term given to flour contaminated with aquantity of alum), without which it would be impossible for him toproduce light, white, and porous bread, from a half-spoiled material. 

The wholesale mealman frequently purchases this spurious commodity, (which forms a separate branch of business in the hands of certainindividuals, ) in order to enable himself to sell his decayed andhalf-spoiled flour. 

Other individuals furnish the baker with alum mixed up with salt, underthe obscure denomination of _stuff_. There are wholesale manufacturingchemists, whose sole business is to crystallise alum, in such a form aswill adapt this salt to the purpose of being mixed in a crystallinestate with the crystals of common salt, to disguise the character ofthe compound. The mixture called _stuff_, is composed of one part ofalum, in minute crystals, and three of common salt. In many other tradesa similar mode of proceeding prevails. Potatoes are soaked in water toaugment their weight. 

The practice of sophisticating the necessaries of life, being reduced tosystematic regularity, is ranked by public opinion among othermercantile pursuits; and is not only regarded with less disgust thanformerly, but is almost generally esteemed as a justifiable way towealth. 

It is really astonishing that the penal law is not more effectuallyenforced against practices so inimical to the public welfare. The manwho robs a fellow subject of a few shillings on the high-way, issentenced to death; while he who distributes a slow poison to a wholecommunity, escapes unpunished. 

It has been urged by some, that, under so vast a system of finance asthat of Great Britain, it is expedient that the revenue should becollected in large amounts; and therefore that the severity of the lawshould be relaxed in favour of all mercantile concerns in proportion totheir extent: encouragement must be given to large capitalists; andwhere an extensive brewery or distillery yields an importantcontribution to the revenue, no strict scrutiny need be adopted inregard to the quality of the article from which such contribution israised, provided the excise do not suffer by the fraud. 

But the principles of the constitution afford no sanction to thispreference, and the true interests of the country require that it shouldbe abolished; for a tax dependent upon deception must be at bestprecarious, and must be, sooner or later, diminished by the irresistiblediffusion of knowledge. Sound policy requires that the law should beimpartially enforced in all cases; and if its penalties were extended toabuses of which it does not now take cognisance, there is no doubt thatthe revenue would be abundantly benefited. 

Another species of fraud, to which I shall at present but brieflyadvert, and which has increased to so alarming an extent, that it loudlycalls for the interference of government, is the adulteration of drugsand medicines. 

Nine-tenths of the most potent drugs and chemical preparations used inpharmacy, are vended in a sophisticated state by dealers who would bethe last to be suspected. It is well known, that of the article Peruvianbark, there is a variety of species inferior to the genuine; that toolittle discrimination is exercised by the collectors of this preciousmedicament; that it is carelessly assorted, and is frequently packed ingreen hides; that much of it arrives in Spain in a half-decayed state, mixed with fragments of other vegetables and various extraneoussubstances; and in this state is distributed throughout Europe. 

But as if this were not a sufficient deterioration, the public are oftenserved with a spurious compound of mahogany saw-dust and oak wood, ground into powder mixed with a proportion of good quinquina, and soldas genuine bark powder. 

Every chemist knows that there are mills constantly at work in thismetropolis, which furnish bark powder at a much cheaper rate than thesubstance can be procured for in its natural state. The price of thebest genuine bark, upon an average, is not lower than twelve shillingsthe pound; but immense quantities of powder bark are supplied to theapothecaries at three or four shillings a pound. 

It is also notorious that there are manufacturers of spurious rhubarbpowder, ipecacuanha powder, [2] James's powder; and other simple andcompound medicines of great potency, who carry on their diabolical tradeon an amazingly large scale. Indeed, the quantity of medicalpreparations thus sophisticated exceeds belief. Cheapness, and notgenuineness and excellence, is the grand desideratum with theunprincipled dealers in drugs and medicines. 

Those who are familiar with chemistry may easily convince themselves ofthe existence of the fraud, by subjecting to a chemical examinationeither spirits of hartshorn, magnesia, calcined magnesia, calomel, orany other chemical preparation in general demand. 

Spirit of hartshorn is counterfeited by mixing liquid caustic ammoniawith the distilled spirit of hartshorn, to increase the pungency of itsodour, and to enable it to bear an addition of water. 

The fraud is detected by adding spirit of wine to the sophisticatedspirit; for, if no considerable coagulation ensues, the adulteration isproved. It may also be discovered by the hartshorn spirit not producinga brisk effervescence when mixed with muriatic or nitric acid. 

Magnesia usually contains a portion of lime, originating from hard waterbeing used instead of soft, in the preparation of this medicine. 

To ascertain the purity of magnesia, add to a portion of it a littlesulphuric acid, diluted with ten times its bulk of water. If themagnesia be completely soluble, and the solution remains transparent, itmay be pronounced _pure_; but not otherwise. Or, dissolve a portion ofthe magnesia in muriatic acid, and add a solution of sub-carbonate ofammonia. If any lime be present, it will form a precipitate; whereaspure magnesia will remain in solution. 

Calcined magnesia is seldom met with in a pure state. It may be assayedby the same tests as the common magnesia. It ought not to effervesce atall, with dilute sulphuric acid; and, if the magnesia and acid be puttogether into one scale of a balance, no diminution of weight shouldensue on mixing them together. Calcined magnesia, however, is veryseldom so pure as to be totally dissolved by diluted sulphuric acid;for a small insoluble residue generally remains, consisting chiefly ofsilicious earth, derived from the alkali employed in the preparation ofit. The solution in sulphuric acid, when largely diluted, ought not toafford any precipitation by the addition of oxalate of ammonia. 

The genuineness of calomel may be ascertained by boiling, for a fewminutes, one part, with 1/32 part of muriate of ammonia in ten parts ofdistilled water. When carbonate of potash is added to the filteredsolution, no precipitation will ensue if the calomel be pure. 

Indeed, some of the most common and cheap drugs do not escape theadulterating hand of the unprincipled druggist. Syrup of buckthorn, forexample, instead of being prepared from the juice of buckthorn berries, (_rhamnus catharticus_, ) is made from the fruit of the blackberrybearing alder, and the dogberry tree. A mixture of the berries of thebuckthorn and blackberry bearing alder, and of the dogberry tree, may beseen publicly exposed for sale by some of the venders of medicinalherbs. This abuse may be discovered by opening the berries: those ofbuckthorn have almost always four seeds; of the alder, two; and of thedogberry, only one. Buckthorn berries, bruised on white paper, stain itof a green colour, which the others do not. 

Instead of worm-seed (_artemisia santonica_, ) the seeds of tansy arefrequently offered for sale, or a mixture of both. 

A great many of the essential oils obtained from the more expensivespices, are frequently so much adulterated, that it is not easy to meetwith such as are at all fit for use: nor are these adulterations easilydiscoverable. The grosser abuses, indeed, may be readily detected. Thus, if the oil be adulterated with alcohol, it will turn milky on theaddition of water; if with expressed oils, alcohol will dissolve thevolatile, and leave the other behind; if with oil of turpentine, ondipping a piece of paper in the mixture, and drying it with a gentleheat, the turpentine will be betrayed by its smell. The more subtileartists, however, have contrived other methods of sophistication, whichelude all trials. And as all volatile oils agree in the generalproperties of solubility in spirit of wine, and volatility in the heatof boiling water, &c. It is plain that they may be variously mixed witheach other, or the dearer sophisticated with the cheaper, without anypossibility of discovering the abuse by any of the before-mentionedtrials. Perfumers assert that the smell and taste are the only certaintests of which the nature of the thing will admit. For example, if abark should have in every respect the appearance of good cinnamon, andshould be proved indisputably to be the genuine bark of the cinnamontree; yet if it want the cinnamon flavour, or has it but in a lowdegree, we reject it: and the case is the same with the essential oil ofcinnamon. It is only from use and habit, or comparisons with specimensof known quality, that we can judge of the goodness, either of the drugsthemselves, or of their oils. 

Most of the arrow-root, the fecula of the Maranta arudinacea, sold bydruggists, is a mixture of potatoe starch and arrow-root. 

The same system of adulteration extends to articles used in varioustrades and manufactures. For instance, linen tape, and various otherhousehold commodities of that kind, instead of being manufactured oflinen thread only, are made up of linen and cotton. Colours forpainting, not only those used by artists, such as ultramarine, [3]carmine, [4] and lake;[5] Antwerp blue, [6] chrome yellow, [7] and Indianink;[8] but also the coarser colours used by the common house-painterare more or less adulterated. Thus, of the latter kind, white lead[9] ismixed with carbonate or sulphate of barytes; vermilion[10] with redlead. 

Soap used in house-keeping is frequently adulterated with aconsiderable portion of fine white clay, brought from St. Stephens, inCornwall. In the manufacture of printing paper, a large quantity ofplaster of Paris is added to the paper stuff, to increase the weight ofthe manufactured article. The selvage of cloth is often dyed with apermanent colour, and artfully stitched to the edge of cloth dyed with afugitive dye. The frauds committed in the tanning of skins, and in themanufacture of cutlery and jewelry, exceed belief. 

The object of all unprincipled modern manufacturers seems to be thesparing of their time and labour as much as possible, and to increasethe quantity of the articles they produce, without much regard to theirquality. The ingenuity and perseverance of self-interest is proofagainst prohibitions, and contrives to elude the vigilance of the mostactive government. 

The eager and insatiable thirst for gain, which seems to be a leadingcharacteristic of the times, calls into action every human faculty, andgives an irresistible impulse to the power of invention; and where lucrebecomes the reigning principle, the possible sacrifice of even a fellowcreature's life is a secondary consideration. In reference to thedeterioration of almost all the necessaries and comforts of existence, it may be justly observed, in a civil as well as a religious sense, that"_in the midst of life we are in death_. "

FOOTNOTES:

[1] _The Times_, May 18, 1818. The King _v. _ Richard Bowman. Thedefendant was a brewer, living in Wapping-street, Wapping, and wascharged with having in his possession a drug called _multum_, and aquantity of copperas. 

The articles were produced by Thomas Gates, an excise officer, who had, after a search, found them on the defendant's premises. The Courtsentenced the defendant to pay a fine of 200_l. _

The King _v. _ Luke Lyons. The defendant is a brewer, and was brought upunder an indictment charging him with having made use of variousdeleterious drugs in his brewery, among which were capsicum, copperas, &c. The defendant was ordered to pay the fines of 20_l. _ upon the firstcount, 200_l. _ upon the third, and 200_l. _ upon the seventh count in theindictment. 

The King _v. _ Thomas Evans. The charge against this defendant was, thathe had in his possession forty-seven barrels of stale unpalatable beer. On, the 11th of March, John Wilson, an excise officer, went to thestorehouse, and found forty-seven casks containing forty-three barrelsand a half of sour unwholesome beer. Several samples of the beer wereproduced, all of them of a different colour, and filled with sediment. Afine of 30_l. _ was ordered to be paid by the defendant. 

[2] Of this root, several varieties are imported. The white sort, whichhas no wrinkles, and no perceptible bitterness in taste, and which, though taken in a large dose, has scarcely any effect at all, afterbeing pulverised by fraudulent druggists, and mixed with a portion ofemetic tartar, is sold, at a low price, for the powder of genuineipecacuanha root. 

[3] Genuine ultramarine should become deprived of its colour when throwninto concentrated nitric acid. 

[4] Genuine carmine should be totally soluble in liquid ammonia. 

[5] Genuine madder and carmine lakes should be totally soluble byboiling in a concentrated solution of soda or potash. 

[6] Genuine Antwerp blue should not become deprived of its colour whenthrown into liquid chlorine. 

[7] Genuine chrome yellow should not effervesce with nitric acid. 

[8] The best Indian ink breaks, splintery, with a smooth glossyfracture, and feels soft, and not gritty, when rubbed against the teeth. 

[9] Genuine white lead should be completely soluble in nitric acid, andthe solution should remain transparent when mingled with a solution ofsulphate of soda. 

[10] Genuine vermilion should become totally volatilised on beingexposed to a red heat; and it should not impart a red colour to spiritof wine, when digested with it. 

REMARKS

ON THE

Effect of different Kinds of Waters

IN THEIR APPLICATION TO

DOMESTIC ECONOMY AND THE ARTS;

AND

METHODS OF ASCERTAINING THEIR PURITY. 

It requires not much reflection to become convinced that the waterswhich issue from the recesses of the earth, and form springs, wells, rivers, or lakes, often materially differ from each other in their tasteand other obvious properties. There are few people who have not observeda difference in the waters used for domestic purposes and in the arts;and the distinctions of _hard_ and _soft_ water are familiar to everybody. 

Water perfectly pure is scarcely ever met with in nature. 

It must also be obvious, that the health and comfort of families, andthe conveniences of domestic life, are materially affected by the supplyof good and wholesome water. Hence a knowledge of the quality andsalubrity of the different kinds of waters employed in the commonconcerns of life, on account of the abundant daily use we make of themin the preparation of food, is unquestionably an object of considerableimportance, and demands our attention. 

The effects produced by the foreign matters which water may contain, aremore considerable, and of greater importance, than might at first beimagined. It cannot be denied, that such waters as are _hard_, or loadedwith earthy matter, have a decided effect upon some important functionsof the human body. They increase the distressing symptoms under whichthose persons labour who are afflicted with what is commonly calledgravel complaints; and many other ailments might be named, that arealways aggravated by the use of waters abounding in saline and earthysubstances. 

The purity of the waters employed in some of the arts and manufactures, is an object of not less consequence. In the process of brewing maltliquors, soft water is preferable to hard. Every brewer knows that thelargest possible quantity of the extractive matter of the malt isobtained in the least possible time, and at the smallest cost, by meansof soft water. 

In the art of the dyer, hard water not only opposes the solution ofseveral dye stuffs, but it also alters the natural tints of somedelicate colours; whilst in others again it precipitates the earthy andsaline matters with which it is impregnated, into the delicate fibres ofthe stuff, and thus impedes the softness and brilliancy of the dye. 

The bleacher cannot use with advantage waters impregnated with earthysalts; and a minute portion of iron imparts to the cloth a yellowishhue. 

To the manufacturer of painters' colours, water as pure as possible isabsolutely essential for the successful preparation of several delicatepigments. Carmine, madder lake, ultramarine, and Indian yellow, cannotbe prepared without perfectly pure water. 

For the steeping or raiting of flax, soft water is absolutely necessary;in hard water the flax may be immersed for months, till its texture beinjured, and still the ligneous matter will not be decomposed, and thefibres properly separated. 

In the culinary art, the effects of water more or less pure arelikewise obvious. Good and pure water softens the fibres of animal andvegetable matters more readily than such as is called _hard_. Every cookknows that dry or ripe pease, and other farinaceous seeds, cannot_readily_ be boiled soft in hard water; because the farina of the seedis not perfectly soluble in water loaded with earthy salts. 

Green esculent vegetable substances are more tender when boiled in softwater than in hard water; although hard water imparts to them a bettercolour. The effects of hard and soft water may be easily shown in thefollowing manner. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Let two separate portions of tea-leaves be macerated, by precisely thesame processes, in circumstances all alike, in similar and separatevessels, the one containing hard and the other soft water, either hot orcold, the infusion made with the soft water will have by far thestrongest taste, although it possesses less colour than the infusionmade with the hard water. It will strike a more intense black with asolution of sulphate of iron, and afford a more abundant precipitate, with a solution of animal jelly, which at once shews that soft water hasextracted more tanning matter, and more gallic acid, from thetea-leaves, than could be obtained from them under like circumstances bymeans of hard water. 

Many animals which are accustomed to drink soft water, refuse hardwater. Horses in particular prefer the former. Pigeons refuse hard waterwhen they have been accustomed to soft water. 

CHARACTERS OF GOOD WATER. 

A good criterion of the purity of water fit for domestic purposes, isits softness. This quality is at once obvious by the touch, if we onlywash our hands in it with soap. Good water should be beautifullytransparent; a slight opacity indicates extraneous matter. To judge ofthe perfect transparency of water, a quantity of it should be put into adeep glass vessel, the larger the better, so that we can look downperpendicularly into a considerable mass of the fluid; we may thenreadily discover the slightest degree of muddiness much better than ifthe water be viewed through the glass placed between the eye and thelight. It should be perfectly colourless, devoid of odour, and itstaste soft and agreeable. It should send out air-bubbles when pouredfrom one vessel into another; it should boil pulse soft, and form withsoap an uniform opaline fluid, which does not separate after standingfor several hours. 

It is to the presence of common air and carbonic acid gas that commonwater owes its taste, and many of the good effects which it produces onanimals and vegetables. Spring water, which contains more air, has amore lively taste than river water. 

Hence the insipid or vapid taste of newly boiled water, from which thesegases are expelled: fish cannot live in water deprived of those elasticfluids. 

100 cubic inches of the New River water, with which part of thismetropolis is supplied, contains 2, 25 of carbonic acid, and 1, 25 ofcommon air. The water of the river Thames contains rather a largerquantity of common air, and a smaller portion of carbonic acid. 

If water not fully saturated with common air be agitated with thiselastic fluid, a portion of the air is absorbed; but the two chiefconstituent gases of the atmosphere, the oxygen and nitrogen, are notequally affected, the former being absorbed in preference to the latter. 

According to Mr. Dalton, in agitating water with atmospheric air, consisting of 79 of nitrogen, and 21 of oxygen, the water absorbs 1/64of 79/100 nitrogen gas = 1, 234, and 1/27 of 21/100 oxygen gas = 778, amounting in all to 2, 012. 

Water is freed from foreign matter by distillation: and for any chemicalprocess in which accuracy is requisite, distilled water must be used. 

Hard waters may, in general, be cured in part, by dropping into them asolution of sub-carbonate of potash; or, if the hardness be owing onlyto the presence of super-carbonate of lime, mere boiling will greatlyremedy the defect; part of the carbonic acid flies off, and a neutralcarbonate of lime falls down to the bottom; it may then be used forwashing, scarcely curdling soap. But if the hardness be owing in part tosulphate of lime, boiling does not soften it at all. 

When spring water is used for washing, it is advantageous to leave itfor some time exposed to the open air in a reservoir with a largesurface. Part of the carbonic acid becomes thus dissipated, and part ofthe carbonate of lime falls to the bottom. Mr. Dalton[11] has observedthat the more any spring is drawn from, the softer the water becomes. 

CHEMICAL CONSTITUTION OF THE WATERS USED IN DOMESTIC ECONOMY AND THEARTS. 

_Rain Water_, Collected with every precaution as it descends from the clouds, and at adistance from large towns, or any other object capable of impregnatingthe atmosphere with foreign matters, approaches more nearly to a stateof purity than perhaps any other natural water. Even collected underthese circumstances, however, it invariably contains a portion of commonair and carbonic acid gas. The specific gravity of rain water scarcelydiffers from that of distilled water; and from the minute portions ofthe foreign ingredients which it generally contains, it is very _soft_, and admirably adapted for many culinary purposes, and various processesin different manufactures and the arts. 

Fresh-fallen _snow_, melted without the contact of air, appears to benearly free from air. Gay-Lussac and Humboldt, however, affirm, that itcontains nearly the usual proportion of air. 

Water from melted _ice_ does not contain so much air. _Dew_ has beensupposed to be saturated with air. 

Snow water has long laid under the imputation of occasioning thosestrumous swellings in the neck which deform the inhabitants of many ofthe Alpine vallies; but this opinion is not supported by anywell-authenticated indisputable facts, and is rendered still moreimprobable, if not entirely overturned, by the frequency of the diseasein Sumatra[12], where ice and snow are never seen. 

In high northern latitudes, thawed snow forms the constant drink of theinhabitants during winter; and the vast masses of ice which float on thepolar seas, afford an abundant supply of fresh water to the mariner. 

_Spring Water_, Includes well-water and all others that arise from some depth below thesurface of the earth, and which are used at the fountain-head, or atleast before they have run any considerable distance exposed to the air. Indeed, springs may be considered as rain water which has passed throughthe fissures of the earth, and, having accumulated at the bottom ofdeclivities, rises again to the surface forming springs and wells. Aswells take their origin at some depth from the surface, and below theinfluence of the external atmosphere, their temperature is in generalpretty uniform during every vicissitude of season, and always severaldegrees lower than the atmosphere. They differ from one anotheraccording to the nature of the strata through which they issue; forthough the ingredients usually existing in them are in such minutequantities as to impart to the water no striking properties, and do notrender it unfit for common purposes, yet they modify its nature veryconsiderably. Hence the water of some springs is said to be _hard_, ofothers _soft_, some _sweet_, others _brackish_, according to the natureand degree of the inpregnating ingredients. 

Common springs are insensibly changed into mineral or medicinal springs, as their foreign contents become larger or more unusual; or, in someinstances, they derive medicinal celebrity from the absence of thoseingredients usually occurring in spring-water; as, for example, is thecase with the Malvern spring, which is nearly pure water. 

Almost all spring-waters possess the property termed _hardness_ in agreater or less degree; a property which depends chiefly upon thepresence of super-carbonate, or of sulphate of lime, or of both; and thequantity of these earthy salts varies very considerably in differentinstances. Mr. Dalton[13] has shewn that one grain of sulphate of lime, contained in 2000 grains of water, converts it into the hardest springwater that is commonly met with. 

The waters of deep wells are usually much harder than those of springswhich overflow the mouth of the well; but there are some exceptions tothis rule. 

The purest springs are those which occur in primitive rocks, or beds ofgravel, or filter through sand or silicious strata. In general, largesprings are purer than small ones: and our old wells contain finer waterthan those that are new, as the soluble parts through which the waterfilters in channels under ground become gradually washed away. 

_River Water_, Is a term applied to every running stream or rivulet exposed to the air, and always flowing in an open channel. It is formed of spring water, which, by exposure, becomes more pure, and of running land or surfacewater, which, although turbid from particles of the alluvial soilsuspended in it, is otherwise very pure. It is purest when it runs overa gravelly or rocky bed, and when its course is swift. It is generallysoft, and more free from earthy salts than spring water; but it usuallycontains less common air and carbonic acid gas; for, by the agitation ofa long current, and exposed to the temperature of the atmosphere, partof its carbonic acid gas is disengaged, and the lime held in solution byit is in part precipitated, the loss of which contributes to thesoftness of the water. Its specific gravity thereby becomes less, thetaste not so harsh, but less fresh and agreeable; and out of a hardspring is often made a stream of sufficient purity for most of thepurposes where a soft water is required. 

The water called in this metropolis _New River Water_, contains a minuteportion of muriate of lime, carbonate of lime, and muriate of soda. 

Some streams, however, that arise from clean silicious beds, and flow ina sandy or stony channel, are from the outset remarkably pure; such asthe mountain lakes and rivulets in the rocky districts of Wales, thesource of the beautiful waters of the Dee, and numberless other riversthat flow through the hollow of every valley. Switzerland has long beencelebrated for the purity and excellence of its waters, which pour incopious streams from the mountains, and give rise to the finest riversin Europe. 

Some rivers, however, that do not take their rise from a rocky soil, andare indeed at first considerably charged with foreign matter, during along course, even over a richly cultivated plain, become remarkably pureas to saline contents; but often fouled with mud containing much animaland vegetable matter, which are rather suspended than held in truesolution. Such is the water of the river Thames, which, taken up atLondon at low water mark, is very soft and good; and, after rest, itcontains but a very small portion of any thing that could provepernicious, or impede any manufacture. It is also excellently fitted forsea-store; but it then undergoes a remarkable spontaneous change, whenpreserved in wooden casks. No water carried to sea becomes putrid soonerthan that of the Thames. But the mode now adopted in the navy ofsubstituting iron tanks for wooden casks, tends greatly to obviate thisdisadvantage. 

Whoever will consider the situation of the Thames, and the immensepopulation along its banks for so many miles, must at once perceive theprodigious accumulation of animal matters of all kinds, which by meansof the common sewers constantly make their way into it. These mattersare, no doubt, in part the cause of the putrefaction which it is wellknown to undergo at sea, and of the carburetted and sulphurettedhydrogen gases which are evolved from it. When a wooden cask is opened, after being kept a month or two, a quantity of carburetted andsulphuretted hydrogen escapes, and the water is so black and offensiveas scarcely to be borne. Upon racking it off, however, into largeearthen vessels, and exposing it to the air, it gradually deposits aquantity of black slimy mud, becomes clear as crystal, and remarkablysweet and palatable. 

It might, at first sight, be expected that the water of the Thames, after having received all the contents of the sewers, drains, and watercourses, of a large town, should acquire thereby such impregnation withforeign matters, as to become very impure; but it appears, from the mostaccurate experiments that have been made, that those kinds of impuritieshave no perceptible influence on the salubrious quality of a mass ofwater so immense, and constantly kept in motion by the action of thetides. 

Some traces of animal matter may, however, be detected in the water ofthe Thames; for if nitrate of lead be dropped into it, [14] "you willfind that it becomes milky, and that a white powder falls to the bottom, which dissolves without effervescence in nitric acid. It is, therefore, (says Dr. Thomson) a combination of oxide of lead with some animalmatter. "

SUBSTANCES USUALLY CONTAINED IN COMMON WATER, AND TESTS BY WHICH THEYARE DETECTED. 

To acquire a knowledge of the general nature of common water, it is onlynecessary to add to it a few chemical tests, which will quickly indicatethe presence or absence of the substances that may be expected. 

Almost the only salts contained in common waters are the carbonates, sulphates, and muriates of soda, lime, and magnesia; and sometimes avery minute portion of iron may also be detected in them. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Fill a wine-glass with distilled water, and add to it a few drops of asolution of soap in alcohol, the water will remain transparent. 

This test is employed for ascertaining the presence of earthy salts inwaters. Hence it produces no change when mingled with distilled orperfectly pure water; but when added to water containing earthy salts, awhite flocculent matter becomes separated, which speedily collects onthe surface of the fluid. Now, from the quantity of flocculent matterproduced, in equal quantities of water submitted to the test, atolerable notion may be formed of the degrees of hardness of differentkinds of water, at least so far as regards the fitness of the water forthe ordinary purposes of domestic economy. This may be rendered obviousin the following manner. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Fill a number of wine-glasses with different kinds of pump or wellwater, and let fall into each glass a few drops of the solution of soapin alcohol. A turbidness will instantly ensue, and a flocculent mattercollect on the surface of the fluid, if the mixture be left undisturbed. The quantity of flocculent matter will be in the ratio of the quantityof earthy salts contained in the water. 

It is obvious that the action of this test is not discriminative, withregard to the chemical nature of the earthy salt present in the water. It serves only to indicate the _presence_ or _absence_ of those kinds ofsubstances which occasion that quality in water which is usually called_hardness_, and which is always owing to salts with an earthy base. 

If we wish to know the nature of the different acids and earthscontained in the water, the following test may be employed. [15]

EXPERIMENT. 

Add about twenty drops of a solution of oxalate of ammonia, to half awine-glass of the water; if a white precipitate ensues, we conclude thatthe water contains lime. 

By means of this test, one grain of lime may be detected in 24, 250 ofwater. 

If this test occasion a white precipitate in water taken fresh from thepump or spring, and not after the water has been boiled and suffered togrow cold, the lime is dissolved in the water by an excess of carbonicacid; and if it continues to produce a precipitate in the water whichhas been concentrated by boiling, we then are sure that the lime iscombined with a fixed acid. 

EXPERIMENT. 

To detect the presence of iron, add to a wine-glassful of the water afew drops of an infusion of nut-galls; or better, suffer a nut-gall tobe suspended in it for twenty-four hours, which will cause the water toacquire a blueish black colour, if iron be present. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Add a few grains of muriate of barytes, to half a wine-glass of thewater to be examined; if it produces a turbidness which does notdisappear by the admixture of a few drops of muriatic acid, the presenceof sulphuric acid is rendered obvious. 

EXPERIMENT. 

If a few drops of a solution of nitrate of silver occasions a milkinesswith the water, which vanishes again by the copious addition of liquidammonia, we have reason to believe that the water contains a salt, oneof the constituent parts of which is muriatic acid. 

EXPERIMENT. 

If lime water or barytic water occasions a precipitate which againvanishes by the admixture of muriatic acid, then carbonic acid ispresent in the water. 

EXPERIMENT. 

If a solution of phosphate of soda produces a milkiness with the water, after a previous addition to it of a similar quantity of neutralcarbonate of ammonia, we may then expect magnesia. The application ofthis test is best made in the following manner:

Concentrate a quantity of the water to be examined to about 1/20 part ofits bulk, and drop into about half a wine-glassful, about five grains ofneutral carbonate of ammonia. No magnesia becomes yet precipitated ifthis earth be present; but on adding a like quantity of phosphate ofsoda, the magnesia falls down, as an insoluble salt. It is essentialthat the carbonate of ammonia be neutral. 

This test was first pointed out by Dr. Wollaston. 

The presence of oxygen gas loosely combined in water may readily bediscovered in the following manner. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Fill a vial with water, and add to it a small quantity of green sulphateof iron. If the water be entirely free of oxygen, and if the vessel bewell stopped and completely filled, the solution is transparent; but ifotherwise, it soon becomes slightly turbid, from the oxide of ironattracting the oxygen, and a small portion of it, in this more highlyoxidated state, leaving the acid and being precipitated. Or, accordingto a method pointed out by Driessen, the water is to be boiled for twohours in a flask filled with it, and immersed in a vessel of water keptboiling, with the mouth of the flask under the surface of the water: itis to be inverted in quicksilver, taking care that no air-bubble adheresto the side of the flask, and being tinged with infusion of litmus, alittle nitrous gas is to be introduced: if the oxygen gas has beensufficiently expelled from the water, the purple colour of the litmusdoes not change; while, if oxygen be present, it immediately becomesred. [16]

If we examine the different waters which are used for the ordinarypurposes of life, and judge of them by the above tests, we shall findthem to differ considerably from each other. Some contain a largequantity of saline and earthy matters, whilst others are nearly pure. The differences are produced by the great solvent power which waterexercises upon most substances. Wells should never be lined with bricks, which render soft water hard; or, if bricks be employed, they should bebedded in and covered with cement. 

METHOD OF ASCERTAINING THE RELATIVE QUANTITY OF EACH OF THE DIFFERENTSUBSTANCES USUALLY CONTAINED IN COMMON WATER. 

To ascertain the quantity of earthy and saline matter contained inwater, the following is the most simple and easy method. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Put any measured quantity of the water into a platina, or silverevaporating basin, the weight of which is known, and evaporate the waterupon a steam bath, at a temperature of about 180°, nearly to dryness;and, lastly, remove the basin to a sand bath, and let the mass beevaporated to perfect dryness. The weight of the platina basin beingalready known, we have only to weigh it carefully. When the solid salinecontents of the water is attached to it, the increase of weight givesthe quantity of solid matter contained in a given quantity of the water. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Pour upon the saline contents a quantity of distilled water equal tothat in which the obtained salts were originally dissolved. If the wholesaline matter become dissolved in this water, there is reason to believethat the saline matter has not been altered during the evaporation ofthe water. But if a portion remain undissolved, as is usually the case, then we may conclude that some of the salts have mutually decomposedeach other, when brought into a concentrated state by the evaporation, and that salts have been formed which did not originally exist in thewater before its evaporation. 

We have already mentioned that almost the only salts contained in commonwaters, are the carbonates, sulphates, and muriates, of soda, lime, andmagnesia; and sometimes a very minute portion of iron. Having determinedthe different acids and bases present, in the manner stated at p. 49, wemay easily ascertain the relative weight of each. 

The following formula suggested by Dr. Murray, [17] is fully as accuratea means of analysing waters as any other, and it is easy of execution. The weight of the saline ingredients of a given quantity of water beingdetermined, we may proceed to the accurate analysis of it in thefollowing manner. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Measure out a determinate volume of the water (as 500 or 1000 cubicinches, ) and evaporate it gradually, in an unglazed open vessel defendedfrom dust, to one third of its original bulk; then divide thisevaporated liquid into three equal portions. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Drop into the first portion, muriate of barytes; wash the precipitate, collect it, dry it at a red heat upon platina foil, and weigh it; digestit in nitric acid, dry it, and weigh it again. The loss of weightindicates the quantity of carbonate of barytes which the precipitatecontained. The residual weight is sulphate of barytes; the carbonic acidin the water is equivalent to 0, 22 of the weight of the carbonate ofbarytes; the sulphuric acid to 0, 339 of the weight of the sulphate ofbarytes. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Precipitate the second portion of the concentrated water, by theaddition of nitrate of silver; wash the precipitate, dry it, and fuse iton a piece of foil platina, previously weighed. By weighing the foilcontaining the fused chloride of silver, the weight of the precipitatemay be ascertained. The fourth part of this weight is equivalent to theweight of the muriatic acid contained in the portion of waterprecipitated. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Precipitate the third portion of the water by the addition of oxalate ofammonia; wash and dry the precipitate; expose it to a red heat, on aplatina foil, or in a capsule of platina; pour on it some dilutesulphuric acid; digest for some time, then evaporate to dryness, exposethe capsule to a pretty strong heat, and, lastly, weigh the sulphate oflime thus produced: 0. 453 of its weight indicate the quantity of lime inthe portion of water precipitated. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Add to the same third portion of the water thus freed from lime, aportion of a solution of neutral carbonate of ammonia, and then addphosphoric acid, drop by drop, as long as any precipitate falls down. Wash the precipitate, dry it, and expose it to a red heat in a platinacapsule: it is phosphate of magnesia. 0. 357 of the weight of this saltis equivalent to the weight of the magnesia contained in the water. 

EXPERIMENT. 

If the water contain a minute portion of iron, a quantity of it equal toone of the three preceding portions, must be taken and mixed with asolution of benzoate of ammonia. The precipitate being washed, dried, and exposed to a red heat, and weighed, nine-tenths of its weightindicate the weight of protoxide of iron contained in the water. 

In this manner the quantity of all the substances contained in the waterwill be ascertained, except there be any soda. To know the amount of it, the following method, pointed out by Dr. Murray, answers very well. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Evaporate a portion of the water to one third of its bulk. Precipitatethe carbonic and sulphuric acids by the addition of muriate of barytes, taking care not to add any excess of the tests. 

Precipitate the lime by oxalate of ammonia, and the magnesia bycarbonate of ammonia and phosphoric acid. (Page 52. ) Then evaporate theliquid thus treated to dryness. A quantity of common salt will remain:let this be exposed to a red heat; 0. 4 of its weight indicate the sodiumcontained in the bulk of water employed; and 0. 4 sodium are equivalentto 0. 53 of soda. 

It seems hardly requisite to mention some other substances thatoccasionally make their appearance in the waters used for domesticpurposes. A fine divided sand is a common constituent, which is easilyobtained in a separate state. We have only to evaporate a portion of thewater to dryness, and redissolve the saline residue in distilled water. The silicious sand remains undissolved, and betrays itself by itsinsolubility in acids, and its easy fusibility into a transparant glass, with soda, before the blow-pipe. 

DELETERIOUS EFFECTS OF KEEPING WATER FOR DOMESTIC ECONOMY IN LEADENRESERVOIRS. 

The deleterious effect of lead, when taken into the stomach, is atpresent so universally known, that it is quite unnecessary to adduceany argument in proof of its dangerous tendency. 

The ancients were, upwards of 2000 years ago, as well aware of thepernicious quality of this metal as we are at the present day; andindeed they appeared to have been much more apprehensive of its effects, and scrupulous in the application of it to purposes of domestic economy. 

Their precautions may have been occasionally carried to an unnecessarylength. This was the natural consequence of the imperfect state ofexperimental knowledge at that period. When men were unable to detectthe poisonous matters--to be over scrupulous in the use of such water, was an error on the right side. 

The moderns, on the other hand, in part, perhaps, from an ill-foundedconfidence, and inattention to a careful and continued examination ofits effects, have fallen into an opposite error. 

There can be no doubt that the mode of preserving water intended forfood or drink in leaden reservoirs, is exceedingly improper; andalthough pure water exercises no sensible action upon metallic lead, provided air be excluded, the metal is certainly acted on by the waterwhen air is admitted: this effect is so obvious, that it cannot escapethe notice of the least attentive observer. 

The white line which may be seen at the surface of the water preservedin leaden cisterns, where the metal touches the water and where the airis admitted, is a carbonate of lead, formed at the expense of the metal. This substance, when taken into the stomach, is highly deleterious tohealth. This was the reason which induced the ancients to condemn leadenpipes for the conveyance of water; it having been remarked that personswho swallowed the sediment of such water, became affected with disordersof the bowels. [18]

Leaden water reservoirs were condemned in ancient times by Hyppocrates, Galen, and Vitruvius, as dangerous: in addition to which, we may dependon the observations of Van Swieten, Tronchin, and others, who havequoted numerous unhappy examples of whole families poisoned by waterwhich had remained in reservoirs of lead. Dr. Johnston, Dr. Percival, Sir George Baker, and Dr. Lamb, have likewise recorded numerousinstances where dangerous diseases ensued from the use of waterimpregnated with lead. 

Different potable waters have unequal solvent powers on this metal. Insome places the use of leaden pumps has been discontinued, from theexpense entailed upon the proprietors by the constant want of repair. Dr. Lamb[19] states an instance where the proprietor of a well orderedhis plumber to make the lead of a pump of double the thickness of themetal usually employed for pumps, to save the charge of repairs; becausehe had observed that the water was so hard, as he called it, that itcorroded the lead very soon. 

The following instance is related by Sir George Baker:[20]

"A gentleman was the father of a numerous offspring, having hadone-and-twenty children, of whom eight died young, and thirteen survivedtheir parents. During their infancy, and indeed _until they had quittedthe place of their usual residence, they were all remarkably unhealthy_;being particularly subject to disorders of the stomach and bowels. Thefather, during many years, was paralytic; the mother, for a long time, was subject to colics and bilious obstructions. 

"After the death of the parents, the family sold the house which theyhad so long inhabited. The purchaser found it necessary to repair thepump. This was made of lead; which, upon examination was found to be socorroded, that several perforations were observed in the cylinder, inwhich the bucket plays; and the cistern in the upper part was reduced tothe thinness of common brown paper, and was full of holes, like asieve. "

I have myself seen numerous instances where leaden cisterns have beencompletely corroded by the action of water with which they were incontact: and there is, perhaps, not a plumber who cannot give testimonyof having experienced numerous similar instances in the practice of histrade. 

I have been frequently called upon to examine leaden cisterns, which hadbecome leaky on account of the action of the water which they contained;and I could adduce an instance of a legal controversy having taken placeto settle the disputes between the proprietors of an estate and aplumber, originating from a similar cause--the plumber being accused ofhaving furnished a faulty reservoir; whereas the case was proved to beowing to the chemical action of the water on the lead. Water containinga large quantity of common air and carbonic acid gas, always acts verysensibly on metallic lead. 

Water, which has no sensible action, in its natural state, upon lead, may acquire the capability of acting on it by heterogeneous matter, which it may accidentally receive. Numerous instances have shewn thatvegetable matter, such as leaves, falling into leaden cisterns filledwith water, imparted to the water a considerable solvent power of actionon the lead, which, in its natural state it did not possess. Hence thenecessity of keeping leaden cisterns clean; and this is the morenecessary, as their situations expose them to accidental impurities. Thenoted saturnine colic of Amsterdam, described by Tronchin, originatedfrom such a circumstance; as also the case related by Van Swieten, [21]of a whole family afflicted with the same complaint, from such acistern. And it is highly probable that the case of disease recorded byDr. Duncan, [22] proceeded more from some foulness in the cistern, thanfrom the solvent power of the water. In this instance the officers ofthe packet boat used water for their drink and cooking out of a leadencistern, whilst the sailors used the water taken from the same source, except that theirs was kept in wooden vessels. The consequence was, thatall the officers were seized with the colic, and all the men continuedhealthy. 

The carelessness of the bulk of mankind, Dr. Lambe very justly observes, to these things, "is so great, that to repeat them again and againcannot be wholly useless. "

Although the great majority of persons who daily use water kept inleaden cisterns receive no sensible injury, yet the apparent salubritymust be ascribed to the great slowness of its operation, and theminuteness of the dose taken, the effects of which become modified bydifferent causes and different constitutions, and according to thepredisposition to diseases inherent in different individuals. Thesupposed security of the multitude who use the water with impunity, amounts to no more than presumption, in favour of any individual, whichmay or may not be confirmed by experience. 

Independent of the morbid susceptibility of impressions whichdistinguish certain habits, there is, besides, much variety in theoriginal constitution of the human frame, of which we are totallyignorant. 

"The susceptibility or proneness to disease of each individual, must beesteemed peculiar to himself. Confiding to the experience of others is aground of security which may prove fallacious; and the danger can withcertainty be obviated only by avoiding its source. And considering thevarious and complicated changes of the human frame, under differentcircumstances and at different ages, it is neither impossible norimprobable that the substances taken into the system at one period, andeven for a series of years, with apparent impunity may, notwithstanding, at another period, be eventually the occasion of disease and of death. 

"The experience of a single person, or of many persons, howevernumerous, is quite incompetent to the decision of a question of thisnature. 

"The pernicious effects of an intemperate use of spiritous liquors isnot less certain because we often see habitual drunkards enjoy a stateof good health, and arrive at old age: and the same may be said ofindividuals who indulge in vices of all kinds, evidently destructive tolife; many of whom, in spite of their bad habits, attain to a vigorousold age. "[23]

In confirmation of these remarks, we adduce the following account of theeffect of water contaminated by lead, given by Sir G. Baker:

"The most remarkable case on the subject that now occurs to my memory, is that of Lord Ashburnham's family, in Sussex; to which, spring waterwas supplied, from a considerable distance, in leaden pipes. Inconsequence, his Lordship's servants were every year tormented withcolic, and some of them died. An eminent physician, of Battle, whocorresponded with me on the subject, sent up some gallons of that water, which were analysed by Dr. Higgins, who reported that the water hadcontained more than the common quantity of carbonic acid; and that hefound in it lead in solution, which he attributed to the carbonic acid. In consequence of this, Lord Ashburnham substituted wooden for leadenpipes; and from that time his family have had no particular complaintsin their bowels. "

_Richmond, Sept. 27, 1802. _

METHOD OF DETECTING LEAD, WHEN CONTAINED IN WATER. 

One of the most delicate tests for detecting lead, is water impregnatedwith sulphuretted hydrogen gas, which instantly imparts to the fluidcontaining the minutest quantity of lead, a brown or blackish tinge. 

This test is so delicate that distilled water, when condensed by aleaden pipe in a still tub, is affected by it. To shew the action ofthis test, the following experiments will serve. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Pour into a wine-glass containing distilled water, an equal quantity ofwater impregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen gas: no change will takeplace; but if a 1/4 of a grain of acetate of lead (sugar of lead ofcommerce), or any other preparation of lead, be added, the mixture willinstantly turn brown and dark-coloured. 

To apply this test, one part of the suspected water need merely to bemingled with a like quantity of water impregnated with sulphurettedhydrogen. Or better, a larger quantity, a gallon for example, of thewater may be concentrated by evaporation to about half a pint, and thensubmitted to the action of the test. 

Another and more efficient mode of applying this test, is, to pass acurrent of sulphuretted hydrogen gas through the suspected water in thefollowing manner. 

EXPERIMENT. 

[Illustration]

Take a bottle (_a_) or Florence flask, adapt to the mouth of it a corkfurnished with a glass tube (_b_), bent at right angles; let one leg ofthe tube be immersed in the vial (_c_) containing the water to beexamined; as shewn in the following sketch. Then take one part ofsulphuret of antimony of commerce, break it into pieces of half the sizeof split pease, put it into the flask, and pour upon it four parts ofcommon concentrated muriatic acid (spirit of salt of commerce). Sulphuretted hydrogen gas will become disengaged from the materials inabundance, and pass through the water in the vial (_c_). Let theextrication of the gas be continued for about five minutes; and if theminutest quantity of lead be present, the water will acquire adark-brown or blackish tinge. The extrication of the gas is facilitatedby the application of a gentle heat. 

The action of the sulphuretted hydrogen test, when applied in thismanner, is astonishingly great; for one part of acetate of lead may bedetected by means of it, in 20000 parts of water. [24]

Another test for readily detecting lead in water, is sulphurettedchyazate of potash, first pointed out as such by Mr. Porret. A few dropsof this re-agent, added to water containing lead, occasion a whiteprecipitate, consisting of small brilliant scales of a considerablelustre. 

Sulphate of potash, or sulphate of soda, is likewise a very delicatetest for detecting minute portions of lead. Dr. Thomson[25] discovered, by means of it, one part of lead in 100000 parts of water; and thisacute Philosopher considers it as the most unequivocal test of lead thatwe possess. Dr. Thomson remarks that "no other precipitate can well beconfounded with it, except sulphate of barytes; and there is noprobability of the presence of barytes existing in common water. "

Carbonate of potash, or carbonate of soda, may also be used as agents todetect the presence of lead. By means of these salts Dr. Thomson wasenabled to detect the presence of a smaller quantity of lead indistilled water, than by the action of sulphuretted hydrogen. But thereader must here be told, that the use of these tests cannot beentrusted to an unskilful hand; because the alkaline carbonates throwdown also lime and magnesia, two substances which are frequently foundin common water; the former tests, namely, water impregnated withsulphuretted hydrogen gas, and nascent sulphuretted hydrogen, aretherefore preferable. 

It is absolutely essential that the water impregnated with sulphurettedhydrogen, when employed as a test for detecting very minute quantitiesof lead, be fresh prepared; and if sulphate of potash, or sulphate ofsoda, be used as tests, they should be perfectly pure. Sulphate ofpotash is preferable to sulphate of soda. It is likewise advisable toact with these tests upon water concentrated by boiling. The water towhich the test has been added does sometimes appear not to undergo anychange, at first; it is therefore necessary to suffer the mixture tostand for a few hours; after which time the action of the test will bemore evident. Mr. Silvester[26] has proposed gallic acid as a delicatetest for detecting lead. 

FOOTNOTES:

[11] Dalton, Manchester Memoirs, vol. Iv. P. 55. 

[12] Marsden's History of Sumatra. 

[13] Manchester Memoirs vol. X. 1819. 

[14] Observations on the Water with which Tunbridge Wells is chieflysupplied for Domestic Purposes, by Dr. Thomson; forming an Appendix toan Analysis of the Mineral Waters of Tunbridge Wells, by Dr. Scudamore. 

[15] It is absolutely essential that the tests should be pure. 

[16] Philosophical Magazine, vol. Xv. P. 252. 

[17] Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, vol. Viii. P. 259. 

[18] Sir G. Baker, Med. Trans. Vol. I. P. 280. 

[19] Lamb on Spring Water. 

[20] Medical Trans. Vol. I. P. 420. 

[21] Van Swieten ad Boerhaave, Aphorisms, 1060. Comment. 

[22] Medical Comment. Dec. 2, 1794. 

[23] Lambe on Spring Water. 

[24] See An Analysis of the Mineral Waters of Tunbridge Wells, by Dr. Scudamore, p. 55. 

The application of the sulphuretted hydrogen test requires someprecautions in those cases where other metals besides lead may beexpected; because silver, quicksilver, tin, copper, and several othermetals, are affected by it, as well as lead; but there is no chance ofthese metals being met with in common water. --See _Chemical Tests_, third edition, p. 207. 

[25] Analysis of Tunbridge Wells Water, by Dr. Scudamore, p. 55. 

[26] Nicholson's Journal, p. 33, 310. 

_Adulteration of Wine. _

It is sufficiently obvious, that few of those commodities, which are theobjects of commerce, are adulterated to a greater extent than wine. Allpersons moderately conversant with the subject, are aware, that aportion of alum is added to young and meagre red wines, for the purposeof brightening their colour; that Brazil wood, or the husks ofelderberries and bilberries, [27] are employed to impart a deep richpurple tint to red Port of a pale, faint colour; that gypsum is used torender cloudy white wines transparent;[28] that an additionalastringency is imparted to immature red wines by means of oak-woodsawdust, [29] and the husks of filberts; and that a mixture of spoiledforeign and home-made wines is converted into the wretched compoundfrequently sold in this town by the name of _genuine old Port_. 

Various expedients are resorted to for the purpose of communicatingparticular flavours to insipid wines. Thus a _nutty_ flavour is producedby bitter almonds; factitious Port wine is flavoured with a tincturedrawn from the seeds of raisins; and the ingredients employed to formthe _bouquet_ of high-flavoured wines, are sweet-brier, oris-root, clary, cherry laurel water, and elder-flowers. 

The flavouring ingredients used by manufacturers, may all be purchasedby those dealers in wine who are initiated in the mysteries of thetrade; and even a manuscript recipe book for preparing them, and thewhole mystery of managing all sorts of wines, may be obtained on paymentof a considerable fee. 

The sophistication of wine with substances not absolutely noxious tohealth, is carried to an enormous extent in this metropolis. Manythousand pipes of spoiled cyder are annually brought hither from thecountry, for the purpose of being converted into factitious Port wine. The art of manufacturing spurious wine is a regular trade of greatextent in this metropolis. 

"There is, in this city, a certain fraternity of chemical operators, whowork underground in holes, caverns, and dark retirements, to concealtheir mysteries from the eyes and observation of mankind. Thesesubterraneous philosophers are daily employed in the transmutation ofliquors; and by the power of magical drugs and incantations, raisingunder the streets of London the choicest products of the hills andvalleys of France. They can squeeze Bourdeaux out of the sloe, and drawChampagne from an apple. Virgil, in that remarkable prophecy, _Incultisque ruhens pendebit sentibus uva. _

 Virg. Ecl. Iv. 29. 

 The ripening grape shall hang on every thorn. 

seems to have hinted at this art, which can turn a plantation ofnorthern hedges into a vineyard. These adepts are known among oneanother by the name of _Wine-brewers_; and, I am afraid, do greatinjury, not only to her Majesty's customs, but to the bodies of many ofher good subjects. "[30]

The following are a few of the recipes employed in the manufacture ofspurious wine:

 To make _British Port Wine_. [31]--"Take of British grape wine, or good cyder, 4 gallons; of the juice of red beet root two quarts; brandy, two quarts; logwood 4 ounces; rhatany root, bruised, half a pound: first infuse the logwood and rhatany root in brandy, and a gallon of grape wine or cyder for one week; then strain off the liquor, and mix it with the other ingredients; keep it in a cask for a month, when it will be fit to bottle. "

 _British Champagne. _--"Take of white sugar, 8 pounds; the whitest brown sugar, 7 pounds, crystalline lemon acid, or tartaric acid, 1 ounce and a quarter, pure water, 8 gallons; white grape wine, two quarts, or perry, 4 quarts; of French brandy, 3 pints. "

 "Put the sugar in the water, skimming it occasionally for two hours, then pour it into a tub and dissolve in it the acid; before it is cold, add some yeast and ferment. Put it into a clean cask and add the other ingredients. The cask is then to be well bunged, and kept in a cool place for two or three months; then bottle it and keep it cool for a month longer, when it will be fit for use. If it should not be perfectly clear after standing in the cask two or three months, it should be rendered so by the use of isinglass. By adding 1 lb. Of fresh or preserved strawberries, and 2 ounces of powdered cochineal, the PINK _Champagne may be made_. "

 _Southampton Port. _[32]--"Take cyder, 36 gallons; elder wine, 11 gallons; brandy, 5 gallons; damson wine, 11 gallons; mix. "

The particular and separate department in this factitious wine trade, called _crusting_, consists in lining the interior surface of emptywine-bottles, in part, with a red crust of super-tartrate of potash, bysuffering a saturated hot solution of this salt, coloured red with adecoction of Brazil-wood, to crystallize within them; and after thissimulation of maturity is perfected, they are filled with the compoundcalled Port wine. 

Other artisans are regularly employed in staining the lower extremitiesof bottle-corks with a fine red colour, to appear, on being drawn, as ifthey had been long in contact with the wine. 

The preparation of an astringent extract, to produce, from spoiledhome-made and foreign wines, a "genuine old Port, " by mere admixture; orto impart to a weak wine a rough austere taste, a fine colour, and apeculiar flavour; forms one branch of the business of particularwine-coopers: while the mellowing and restoring of spoiled white wines, is the sole occupation of men who are called _refiners of wine_. 

We have stated that a crystalline crust is formed on the interiorsurface of bottles, for the purpose of misleading the unwary into abelief that the wine contained in them is of a certain age. Acorrespondent operation is performed on the wooden cask; the wholeinterior of which is stained artificially with a crystalline crust ofsuper-tartrate of potash, artfully affixed in a manner precisely similarto that before stated. Thus the wine-merchant, after bottling off apipe of wine, is enabled to impose on the understanding of hiscustomers, by taking to pieces the cask, and exhibiting the beautifuldark coloured and fine crystalline crust, as an indubitable proof of theage of the wine; a practice by no means uncommon, to flatter the vanityof those who pride themselves in their acute discrimination of wines. 

These and many other sophistications, which have long been practisedwith impunity, are considered as legitimate by those who pridethemselves for their skill in the art of _managing_, or, according tothe familiar phrase, _doctoring_ wines. The plea alleged in exculpationof them, is, that, though deceptive, they are harmless: but evenadmitting this as a palliation, yet they form only one department of anart which includes other processes of a tendency absolutely criminal. 

Several well-authenticated facts have convinced me that the adulterationof wine with substances deleterious to health, is certainly practisedoftener than is, perhaps, suspected; and it would be easy to give someinstances of very serious effects having arisen from wines contaminatedwith deleterious substances, were this a subject on which I meant tospeak. The following statement is copied from the Monthly Magazine forMarch 1811, p. 188. 

"On the 17th of January, the passengers by the Highflyer coach, from thenorth, dined, as usual, at Newark. A bottle of Port wine was ordered; ontasting which, one of the passengers observed that it had an unpleasantflavour, and begged that it might be changed. The waiter took away thebottle, poured into a fresh decanter half the wine which had beenobjected to, and filled it up from another bottle. This he took into theroom, and the greater part was drank by the passengers, who, after thecoach had set out towards Grantham, were seized with extreme sickness;one gentleman in particular, who had taken more of the wine than theothers, it was thought would have died, but has since recovered. Thehalf of the bottle of wine sent out of the passengers' room, was putaside for the purpose of mixing negus. In the evening, Mr. Bland, ofNewark, went into the hotel, and drank a glass or two of wine and water. He returned home at his usual hour, and went to bed; in the middle ofthe night he was taken so ill, as to induce Mrs. Bland to send for hisbrother, an apothecary in the town; but before that gentleman arrived, he was dead. An inquest was held, and the jury, after the fullestenquiry, and the examination of the surgeons by whom the body wasopened, returned a verdict of--_Died by Poison. _"

The most dangerous adulteration of wine is by some preparations of lead, which possess the property of stopping the progress of acescence ofwine, and also of rendering white wines, when muddy, transparent. I havegood reason to state that lead is certainly employed for this purpose. The effect is very rapid; and there appears to be no other method known, of rapidly recovering ropy wines. Wine merchants persuade themselvesthat the minute quantity of lead employed for that purpose is perfectlyharmless, and that no atom of lead remains in the wine. Chemicalanalysis proves the contrary; and the practice of clarifying spoiledwhite wines by means of lead, must be pronounced as highly deleterious. 

Lead, in whatever state it be taken into the stomach, occasions terriblediseases; and wine, adulterated with the minutest quantity of it, becomes a slow poison. The merchant or dealer who practises thisdangerous sophistication, adds the crime of murder to that of fraud, anddeliberately scatters the seeds of disease and death among thoseconsumers who contribute to his emolument. If to debase the currentcoin of the realm be denounced as a capital offence, what punishmentshould be awarded against a practice which converts into poison a liquorused for sacred purposes. 

Dr. Watson[33] relates, that the method of adulterating wine with lead, was at one time a common practice in Paris. 

Dr. Warren[34] states an instance of thirty-two persons having becomeseverely ill, after drinking white wine that had been adulterated withlead. One of them died, and one became paralytic. 

In Graham's Treatise on Wine-Making, [35] under the article of _Secrets_, belonging to the mysteries of vintners, p. 31, lead is recommended toprevent wine from becoming acid. The following lines are copied from Mr. Graham's work:

 "_To hinder Wine from turning. _

 "Put a pound of melted lead, in fair water, into your cask, pretty warm, and stop it close. "

 "_To soften Grey Wine. _

 "Put in a little vinegar wherein litharge has been well steeped, and boil some honey, to draw out the wax. Strain it through a cloth, and put a quart of it into a tierce of wine, and this will mend it. "

 * * * * *

The ancients knew that lead rendered harsh wines milder, and preservedit from acidity, without being aware that it was pernicious: it wastherefore long used with confidence; and when its effects werediscovered, they were not ascribed to that metal, but to some othercause. [36] When the Greek and Roman wine merchants wished to try whethertheir wine was spoiled, they immersed in it a plate of lead;[37] if thecolour of the lead were corroded, they concluded that their wine wasspoiled. Wine may become accidentally impregnated with lead. 

It is well known that bottles in which wine has been kept, are usuallycleaned by means of shot, which by its rolling motion detaches thesuper-tartrate of potash from the sides of the bottles. This practice, which is generally pursued by wine-merchants, may give rise to seriousconsequences, as will become evident from the following case:[38]

"A gentleman who had never in his life experienced a day's illness, andwho was constantly in the habit of drinking half a bottle of Madeirawine after his dinner, was taken ill, three hours after dinner, with asevere pain in the stomach and violent bowel colic, which graduallyyielded within twelve hours to the remedies prescribed by his medicaladviser. The day following he drank the remainder of the same bottle ofwine which was left the preceding day, and within two hours afterwardshe was again seized with the most violent colliquative pains, headach, shiverings, and great pain over the whole body. His apothecary becomingsuspicious that the wine he had drank might be the cause of thedisease, ordered the bottle from which the wine had been decanted to bebrought to him, with a view that he might examine the dregs, if any wereleft. The bottle happening to slip out of the hand of the servant, disclosed a row of shot wedged forcibly into the angular bent-upcircumference of it. On examining the beads of shot, they crumbled intodust, the outer crust (defended by a coat of black lead with which theshot is glazed) being alone left unacted on, whilst the remainder of themetal was dissolved. The wine, therefore, had become contaminated with_lead and arsenic_, the shot being a compound of these metals, which nodoubt had produced the mischief. "

TEST FOR DETECTING THE DELETERIOUS ADULTERATIONS OF WINE. 

A ready re-agent for detecting the presence of lead, or any otherdeleterious metal in wine, is known by the name of the _wine test_. Itconsists of water saturated with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, acidulatedwith muriatic acid. By adding one part of it, to two of wine, or anyother liquid suspected to contain lead, a dark coloured or blackprecipitate will fall down, which does not disappear by an addition ofmuriatic acid; and this precipitate, dried and fused before the blowpipeon a piece of charcoal, yields a globule of metallic lead. This testdoes not precipitate iron; the muriatic acid retains iron in solutionwhen combined with sulphuretted hydrogen; and any acid in the wine hasno effect in precipitating any of the sulphur of the test liquor. Or astill more efficacious method is, to pass a current of sulphurettedhydrogen gas through the wine, in the manner described, p. 70, havingpreviously acidulated the wine with muriatic acid. 

The wine test sometimes employed is prepared in the followingmanner:--Mix equal parts of finely powdered sulphur and of slackedquick-lime, and expose it to a red heat for twenty minutes. Tothirty-six grains of this sulphuret of lime, add twenty-six grains ofsuper-tartrate of potassa; put the mixture into an ounce bottle, andfill up the bottle with water that has been previously boiled, andsuffered to cool. The liquor, after having been repeatedly shaken, andallowed to become clear, by the subsidence of the undissolved matter, may then be poured into another phial, into which about twenty drops ofmuriatic acid have been previously put. It is then ready for use. Thistest, when mingled with wine containing lead or copper, turns the wineof a dark-brown or black colour. But the mere application ofsulphuretted hydrogen gas to wine, acidulated by muriatic acid, is a farmore preferable mode of detecting lead in wine. 

M. Vogel[39] has lately recommended acetate of lead as a test fordetecting extraneous colours in red wine. He remarks, that none of thesubstances that can be employed for colouring wine, such as the berriesof the Vaccinium Mirtillus (bilberries), elderberries, and Campeachwood, produce with genuine red wine, a greenish grey precipitate, whichis the colour that is procured by this test by means of genuine redwines. 

Wine coloured with the juice of the bilberries, or elderberries, orCampeach wood, produces, with acetate of lead, a deep blue precipitate;and Brazil-wood, red saunders, and the red beet, produce a colour whichis precipitated red by acetate of lead. Wine coloured by beet root isalso rendered colourless by lime water; but the weakest acid brings backthe colour. As the colouring matter of red wines resides in the skin ofthe grape, M. Vogel prepared a quantity of skins, and reduced them topowder. In this state he found that they communicated to alcohol a deepred colour: a paper stained with this colour was rendered red by acidsand green by alkalies. 

M. Vogel made a quantity of red wine from black grapes, for the purposeof his experiments; and this produced the genuine greyish greenprecipitate with acetate of lead. He also found the same colouredprecipitate in two specimens of red wine, the genuineness of which couldnot be suspected; the one from Chateau-Marguaux, and the other from theneighbourhood of Coblentz. 

SPECIFIC DIFFERENCES, AND COMPONENT PARTS OF WINE. 

Every body knows that no product of the arts varies so much as wine;that different countries, and sometimes the different provinces of thesame country, produce different wines. These differences, no doubt, mustbe attributed chiefly to the climate in which the vineyard issituated--to its culture--the quantity of sugar contained in the grapejuice--the manufacture of the wine; or the mode of suffering itsfermentation to be accomplished. If the grapes be gathered unripe, thewine abounds with acid; but if the fruit be gathered ripe, the wine willbe rich. When the proportion of sugar in the grape is sufficient, andthe fermentation complete, the wine is perfect and generous. If thequantity of sugar be too large, part of it remains undecomposed, as thefermentation is languid, and the wine is sweet and luscious; if, on thecontrary, it contains, even when full ripe, only a small portion ofsugar, the wine is thin and weak; and if it be bottled before thefermentation be completed, part of the sugar remains undecomposed, thefermentation will go on slowly in the bottle, and, on drawing the cork, the wine sparkles in the glass; as, for example, Champagne. Such winesare not sufficiently mature. When the must is separated from the husk ofthe red grape before it is fermented, the wine has little or no colour:these are called _white_ wines. If, on the contrary, the husks areallowed to remain in the must while the fermentation is going on, thealcohol dissolves the colouring matter of the husks, and the wine iscoloured: such are called _red_ wines. Hence white wines are oftenprepared from red grapes, the liquor being drawn off before it hasacquired the red colour; for the skin of the grape only gives thecolour. Besides in these principal circumstances, wines vary much inflavour. 

All wines contain one common and identical principle, from which theirsimilar effects are produced; namely, _brandy_ or _alcohol_. It isespecially by the different proportions of brandy contained in wines, that they differ most from one another. When wine is distilled, thealcohol readily separates. The spirit thus obtained is well known underthe name of _brandy_. 

All wines contain also a free acid; hence they turn blue tincture ofcabbage, red. The acid found in the greatest abundance in grape wines, is tartaric acid. Every wine contains likewise a portion ofsuper-tartrate of potash, and extractive matter, derived from the juiceof the grape. These substances deposit slowly in the vessel in whichthey are kept. To this is owing the improvement of wine from age. Thosewines which effervesce or froth, when poured into a glass, contain alsocarbonic acid, to which their briskness is owing. The peculiar flavourand odour of different kinds of wines probably depend upon the presenceof a _volatile oil_, so small in quantity that it cannot be separated. 

EASY METHOD OF ASCERTAINING THE QUANTITY OF BRANDY CONTAINED IN VARIOUSSORTS OF WINE. 

The strength of all wines depends upon the quantity of alcohol or brandywhich they contain. Mr. Brande, and Gay-Lussac, have proved, by verydecisive experiments, that all wines contain brandy or alcohol readyformed. The following is the process discovered by Mr. Brande, forascertaining the quantity of spirit, or brandy, contained in differentsorts of wine. 

EXPERIMENT. 

Add to eight parts, by measure, of the wine to be examined, one part ofa concentrated solution of sub-acetate of lead: a dense insolubleprecipitate will ensue; which is a combination of the test liquor withthe colouring, extractive, and acid matter of the wine. Shake themixture for a few minutes, pour the whole upon a filtre, and collect thefiltered fluid. It contains the brandy or spirit, and water of the wine, together with a portion of the sub-acetate of lead. Add, in smallquantities at a time, to this fluid, warm, dry, and pure sub-carbonateof potash (_not salt of tartar, or sub-carbonate of potash ofcommerce_), which has previously been freed from water by heat, till thelast portion added remains undissolved. The brandy or spirit containedin the fluid will become separated; for the sub-carbonate of potashabstracts from it the whole of the water with which it was combined; thebrandy or spirit of wine forming a distinct stratum, which floats uponthe aqueous solution of the alkaline salt. If the experiment be made ina glass tube, from one-half inch to two inches in diameter, andgraduated into 100 equal parts, the _per centage_ of spirit, in a givenquantity of wine, may be read off by mere inspection. In this manner thestrength of any wine may be examined. 

_Tabular View, exhibiting the Per Centage of Brandy or Alcohol[40]contained in various kinds of Wines, and other fermented Liquors. _[41]

 Proportion of Spirit per Cent. By measure. Lissa 26, 47 Ditto 24, 35 Average 25, 41 Raisin Wine 26, 40 Ditto 25, 77 Ditto 23, 30 Average 25, 12 Marcella 26, 03 Ditto 25, 05 Average 25, 09 Madeira 24, 42 Ditto 23, 93 Ditto (Sercial) 21, 40 Ditto 19, 24 Average 22, 27 Port 25, 83 Ditto 24, 29 Ditto 23, 71 Ditto 23, 39 Ditto 22, 30 Ditto 21, 40 Ditto 19, 96 Average 22, 96 Sherry 19, 81 Ditto 19, 83 Ditto 18, 79 Ditto 18, 25 Average 19, 17 Teneriffe 19, 79 Colares 19, 75 Lachryma Christi 19, 70 Constantia (White) 19, 75 Ditto (Red) 18, 92 Lisbon 18, 94 Malaga (1666) 18, 94 Bucellas 18, 49 Red Madeira 22, 30 Ditto 18, 40 Average 20, 35 Cape Muschat 18, 25 Cape Madeira 22, 94 Ditto 20, 50 Ditto 18, 11 Average 20, 51 Grape Wine 18, 11 Calcavella 19, 20 Ditto 18, 10 Average 18, 65 Vidonia 19, 25 Alba Flora 17, 26 Malaga 17, 26 Hermitage (White) 17, 43 Roussillon 19, 00 Ditto 17, 20 Average 18, 13 Claret 17, 11 Ditto 16, 32 Ditto 14, 08 Ditto 12, 91 Average 15, 10 Malmsey Madeira 16, 40 Lunel 15, 52 Sheraaz 15, 52 Syracuse 15, 28 Sauterne 14, 22 Burgundy 16, 60 Ditto 15, 22 Ditto 14, 53 Ditto 11, 95 Average 14, 57 Hock 14, 37 Ditto 13, 00 Ditto (old in cask) 8, 68 Average 12, 08 Nice 14, 62 Barsac 13, 86 Tent 13, 30 Champagne (Still) 13, 80 Ditto (Sparkling) 12, 80 Ditto (Red) 12, 56 Ditto (ditto) 11, 30 Average 12, 61 Red Hermitage 12, 32 Vin de Grave 13, 94 Ditto 12, 80 Average 13, 37 Frontignac 12, 79 Cote Rotie 12, 32 Gooseberry Wine 11, 84 Currant Wine 20, 55 Orange Wine aver. 11, 26 Tokay 9, 88 Elder Wine 9, 87 Cyder highest aver. 9, 87 Ditto lowest ditto 5, 21 Perry average 7, 26 Mead 7, 32 Ale (Burton) 8, 88 Ditto (Edinburgh) 6, 20 Ditto (Dorchester) 5, 50 Average 6, 87 Brown Stout 6, 80 London Porter aver. 4, 20 Do. Small Beer, do. 1, 28 Brandy 53, 39 Rum 53, 68 Gin 51, 60 Scotch Whiskey 54, 32 Irish ditto 53, 99

CONSTITUTION OF HOME-MADE WINES. 

Besides grapes, the most valuable of the articles of which wine is made, there are a considerable number of fruits from which a vinous liquor isobtained. Of such, we have in this country the gooseberry, the currant, the elderberry, the cherry, &c. Which ferment well, and affords what arecalled _home-made wines_. 

They differ chiefly from foreign wines in containing a much largerquantity of acid. Dr. Macculloch[42] has remarked that the acid inhome-made wines is principally the malic acid; while in grape wines itis the tartaric acid. 

The great deficiency in these wines, independent of the flavour, whichchiefly originates, not from the juice, but from the seeds and husks ofthe fruits, is the excess of acid, which is but imperfectly concealed bythe addition of sugar. This is owing, chiefly, as Dr. Maccullochremarks, to the tartaric acid existing in the grape juice in the stateof super-tartrate of potash, which is in part decomposed during thefermentation, and the rest becomes gradually precipitated; whilst themalic acid exists in the currant and gooseberry juice in the form ofmalate of potash; which salt does not appear to suffer a decompositionduring the fermentation of the wine; and, by its greater solubility, isretained in the wine. Hence Dr. Macculloch recommends the addition ofsuper-tartrate of potash, in the manufacture of British wines. They alsocontain a much larger proportion of mucilage than wines made fromgrapes. The juice of the gooseberry contains some portion of tartaricacid; hence it is better suited for the production of what is called_English Champagne_, than any other fruit of this country. 

FOOTNOTES:

[27] Dried bilberries are imported from Germany, under the fallaciousname of _berry-dye_. 

[28] The gypsum had the property of clarifying wines, was known to theancients. "The Greeks and Romans put gypsum in their new wines, stirredit often round, then let it stand for some time; and when it hadsettled, decanted the clear liquor. (_Geopon_, lib. Vii. P. 483, 494. )They knew that the wine acquired, by this addition, a certain sharpness, which it afterwards lost; but that the good effects of the gypsum werelasting. "

[29] Sawdust for this purpose is chiefly supplied by the ship-builders, and forms a regular article of commerce of the brewers' druggists. 

[30] Tatler, vol. Viii. P. 110, edit. 1797. 8vo. 

[31] Dr. Reece's Gazette of Health, No. 7. 

[32] Supplement to the Pharmacopoeias, p. 245. 

[33] Chemical Essays, vol. Viii. P. 369. 

[34] Medical Trans. Vol. Ii. P. 80. 

[35] This book, which has run through many editions, may be supposed tohave done some mischief. --In the Vintner's Guide, 4th edit. 1770, p. 67, a lump of sugar of lead, of the size of a walnut, and a table-spoonfulof sal enixum, are directed to be added to a tierce (forty-two gallons)of muddy wine, _to cure it of its muddiness_. 

[36] Beckman's History of Inventions, vol. I. P. 398. 

[37] Pliny, lib. Xiv. Cap. 20. 

[38] Philosophical Magazine, 1819, No. 257, p. 229. 

[39] Journ. Pharm. Iv. 56 (Feb. 1818. ) and Thomson's Annals, Sept. 1818, p. 232. 

[40] Of a Specific Gravity. 825. 

[41] Philosophical Trans. 1811, p. 345; 1813, p. 87; Journal of Scienceand the Arts, No. Viii. P. 290. 

[42] Macculloch on Wine. This is by far the best treatise published inthis country on the Manufacture of Home-made Wines. 

_Adulteration of Bread. _

This is one of the sophistications of the articles of food most commonlypractised in this metropolis, where the goodness of bread is estimatedentirely by its whiteness. It is therefore usual to add a certainquantity of alum to the dough; this improves the look of the bread verymuch, and renders it whiter and firmer. Good, white, and porous bread, may certainly be manufactured from good wheaten flour alone; but toproduce the degree of whiteness rendered indispensable by the caprice ofthe consumers in London, it is necessary (unless the very best flour isemployed, ) that the dough should be _bleached_; and no substance hashitherto been found to answer this purpose better than alum. 

Without this salt it is impossible to make bread, from the kind of flourusually employed by the London bakers, so white, as that which iscommonly sold in the metropolis. 

If the alum be omitted, the bread has a slight yellowish grey hue--asmay be seen in the instance of what is called _home-made bread_, ofprivate families. Such bread remains longer moist than bread made withalum; yet it is not so light, and full of eyes, or porous, and it hasalso a different taste. 

The quantity of alum requisite to produce the required whiteness andporosity depends entirely upon the genuineness of the flour, and thequality of the grain from which the flour is obtained. The mealman makesdifferent sorts of flour from the same kind of grain. The best flour ismostly used by the biscuit bakers and pastry cooks, and the inferiorsorts in the making of bread. The bakers' flour is very often made ofthe worst kinds of damaged foreign wheat, and other cereal grains mixedwith them in grinding the wheat into flour. In this capital, no fewerthan six distinct kinds of wheaten flour are brought into market. Theyare called fine flour, seconds, middlings, fine middlings, coarsemiddlings, and twenty-penny flour. Common garden beans, and pease, arealso frequently ground up among the London bread flour. 

I have been assured by several bakers, on whose testimony I can rely, that the small profit attached to the bakers' trade, and the badquality of the flour, induces the generality of the London bakers to usealum in the making of their bread. 

The smallest quantity of alum that can be employed with effect toproduce a white, light, and porous bread, from an inferior kind offlour, I have my own baker's authority to state, is from three to fourounces to a sack of flour, weighing 240 pounds. The alum is either mixedwell in the form of powder, with a quantity of flour previously madeinto a liquid paste with water, and then incorporated with the dough; orthe alum is dissolved in the water employed for mixing up the wholequantity of the flour for making the dough. 

Let us suppose that the baker intends to convert five bushels, or a sackof flour, into loaves with the least adulteration practised. He poursthe flour into the kneading trough, and sifts it through a fine wiresieve, which makes it lie very light, and serves to separate anyimpurities with which the flour may be mixed. Two ounces of alum arethen dissolved in about a quart of boiling water, and the solutionpoured into _the seasoning-tub_. Four or five pounds of salt arelikewise put into the tub, and a pailful of hot-water. When this mixturehas cooled down to the temperature of about 84°, three or four pints ofyeast are added; the whole is mixed, strained through the seasoningsieve, emptied into a hole in the flour, and mixed up with the requisiteportion of it to the consistence of a thick batter. Some dry flour isthen sprinkled over the top, and it is covered up with cloths. 

In this situation it is left about three hours. It gradually swells andbreaks through the dry flour scattered on its surface. An additionalquantity of warm water, in which one ounce of alum is dissolved, is nowadded, and the dough is made up into a paste as before; the whole isthen covered up. In this situation it is left for a few hours. 

The whole is then intimately kneaded with more water for upwards of anhour. The dough is cut into pieces with a knife, and penned to one sideof the trough; some dry flour is sprinkled over it, and it is left inthis state for about four hours. It is then kneaded again forhalf-an-hour. The dough is now cut into pieces and weighed, in order tofurnish the requisite quantity for each loaf. The loaves are left in theoven about two hours and a half. When taken out, they are carefullycovered up, to prevent as much as possible the loss of weight. [43]

The following account of making a sack, of five bushels of flour intobread, is taken from Dr. P. Markham's Considerations on the Ingredientsused in the Adulteration of Bread Flour, and Bread, p. 21:

 5 bushels of flour, 8 ounces of alum, [44] 4 lbs. Of salt, 1/2 a gallon of yeast, mixed with about 3 gallons of water. 

 * * * * *

 lbs. The whole quantity of bread-flour obtained } from the bushel of wheat, weighs } 48

 lbs. Fine pollard 4-1/4 Coarse pollard 4 Bran 2-3/4 ------ 11 -- The whole together 59

 To which add the loss of weight in } manufacturing a bushel of wheat } 2 -- Produces the original weight 61 --

The theory of the bleaching property of alum, as manifested in thepanification of an inferior kind of flour, is by no means wellunderstood; and indeed it is really surprising that the effect should beproduced by so small a quantity of that substance, two or three ouncesof alum being sufficient for a sack of flour. 

From experiments in which I have been employed, with the assistance ofskilful bakers, I am authorised to state, that without the addition ofalum, it does not appear possible to make white, light, and porousbread, such as is used in this metropolis, unless the flour be of thevery best quality. 

Another substance employed by fraudulent bakers, is subcarbonate ofammonia. With this salt, they realise the important consideration ofproducing light and porous bread, from spoiled, or what is technicallycalled _sour flour_. This salt which becomes wholly converted into agaseous state during the operation of baking, causes the dough to swellup into air bubbles, which carry before them the stiff dough, and thusit renders the dough porous; the salt itself is, at the same time, totally volatilised during the operation of baking. Thus not a vestigeof carbonate of ammonia remains in the bread. This salt is also largelyemployed by the biscuit and ginger-bread bakers. 

Potatoes are likewise largely, and perhaps constantly, used byfraudulent bakers, as a cheap ingredient, to enhance their profit. Thepotatoes being boiled, are triturated, passed through a sieve, andincorporated with the dough by kneading. This adulteration does notmaterially injure the bread. The bakers assert, that the bad quality ofthe flour renders the addition of potatoes advantageous as well to thebaker as to the purchaser, and that without this admixture in themanufacture of bread, it would be impossible to carry on the trade of abaker. But the grievance is, that the same price is taken for a potatoeloaf, as for a loaf of genuine bread, though it must cost the bakerless. 

I have witness, that five bushels of flour, three ounces of alum, sixpounds of salt, one bushel of potatoes boiled into a stiff paste, andthree quarts of yeast, with the requisite quantity of water, produce awhite, light, and highly palatable bread. 

Such are the artifices practised in the preparation of bread, [45] and itmust be allowed, on contrasting them with those sophisticationspractised by manufacturers of other articles of food, that they arecomparatively unimportant. However, some medical men have no hesitationin attributing many diseases incidental to children to the use of eatingadulterated bread; others again will not admit these allegations: theypersuade themselves that the small quantity of alum added to the bread(perhaps upon an average, from eight to ten grains to a quartern loaf, )is absolutely harmless. 

Dr. Edmund Davy, Professor of Chemistry, at the Cork Institution, hascommunicated the following important facts to the public concerning themanufacture of bread. 

"The carbonate of magnesia of the shops, when well mixed with flour, inthe proportion of from twenty to forty grains to a pound of flour, materially improves it for the purpose of making bread. 

"Loaves made with the addition of carbonate of magnesia, rise well inthe oven; and after being baked, the bread is light and spongy, has agood taste, and keeps well. In cases when the new flour is of anindifferent quality, from twenty to thirty grains of carbonate ofmagnesia to a pound of the flour will considerably improve the bread. When the flour is of the worst quality, forty grains to a pound of flourseem necessary to produce the same effect. 

"As the improvement in the bread from new flour depends upon thecarbonate of magnesia, it is necessary that care should be taken to mixit intimately with the flour, previous to the making of the dough. 

"Mr. Davy made a great number of comparative experiments with othersubstances, mixed in different proportions with new bread flour. Thefixed alkalies, both in their pure and carbonated state, when used insmall quantity, to a certain extent were found to improve the bread madefrom new flour; but no substance was so efficacious in this respect ascarbonate of magnesia. 

"The greater number of his experiments were performed on the worst new_seconds_ flour Mr. Davy could procure. He also made some trials on_seconds_ and _firsts_ of different quality. In some cases the resultswere more striking and satisfactory than in others; but in everyinstance the improvement of the bread, by carbonate of magnesia, wasobvious. 

"Mr. Davy observes, that a pound of carbonate of magnesia would besufficient to mix with two hundred and fifty-six pounds of new flour, orat the rate of thirty grains to the pound. And supposing a pound ofcarbonate of magnesia to cost half-a-crown, the additional expense wouldbe only half a farthing in the pound of flour. 

"Mr. Davy conceives that not the slightest danger can be apprehendedfrom the use of such an innocent substance, as the carbonate ofmagnesia, in such small proportion as is necessary to improve bread fromnew flour. "

METHOD OF DETECTING THE PRESENCE OF ALUM IN BREAD. 

Pour upon two ounces of the suspected bread, half a pint of boilingdistilled water; boil the mixture for a few minutes, and filter itthrough unsized paper. Evaporate the fluid, to about one fourth of itsoriginal bulk, and let gradually fall into the clear fluid a solution ofmuriate of barytes. If a _copious_ white precipitate ensues, which doesnot disappear by the addition of _pure_ nitric acid, the presence ofalum may be suspected. Bread, made without alum, produces, when assayedin this manner, merely a very slight precipitate, which originates froma minute portion of sulphate of magnesia contained in all common salt ofcommerce; and bread made with salt freed from sulphate of magnesia, produces an infusion with water, which does not become disturbed by thebarytic test. 

Other means of detecting all the constituent parts of alum, namely, thealumine, sulphuric acid, and potash, so as to render the presence of thealum unequivocal, will readily suggest itself to those who are familiarwith analytical chemistry; namely: one of the readiest means is, todecompose the vegetable matter of the bread, by the action of chlorateof potash, in a platina crucible, at a red heat, and then to assay theresiduary mass--by means of muriate of barytes, for sulphuric acid; byammonia, for alumine; and by muriate of platina, for potash[46]. Theabove method of detecting the presence of alum, must therefore be takenwith some limitation. 

There is no unequivocal test for detecting in a _ready manner_ thepresence of alum in bread, on account of the impurity of the common saltused in the making of bread. If we could, in the ordinary way of breadmaking, employ common salt, absolutely free from foreign salinesubstances, the mode of detecting the presence of alum, or at least oneof its constituent parts, namely, the sulphuric acid, would be veryeasy. Some conjecture may, nevertheless, be formed of the presence, orabsence, of alum, by assaying the infusion of bread in the mannerstated, p. 109, and comparing the assay with the results afforded by aninfusion of home-made or household bread, known to be genuine, andactually assayed in a similar manner. 

EASY METHOD OF JUDGING OF THE GOODNESS OF BREAD CORN, AND BREAD-FLOUR. 

Millers judge of the goodness of bread corn by the quantity of branwhich the grain produces. 

Such grains as are full and plump, that have a bright and shiningappearance, without any shrivelling and shrinking in the covering ofthe skin, are the best; for wrinkled grains have a greater quantity ofskin, or bran, than such as are sound or plump. 

Pastry-cooks and bakers judge of the goodness of flour in the manner inwhich it comports itself in kneading. The best kind of wheaten flourassumes, at the instant it is formed into paste by the addition ofwater, a very gluey, ductile, and elastic paste, easy to be kneaded, andwhich may be elongated, flattened, and drawn in every direction, withoutbreaking. 

For the following fact we are indebted to Mr. Hatchet. 

"Grain which has been heated or burnt in the stack, may in the followingmanner be rendered fit for being made into bread:

"The wheat must be put into a vessel capable of holding at least threetimes the quantity, and the vessel filled with boiling water; the grainshould then be occasionally stirred, and the hollow decayed grains, which float, may be removed. When the water has become cold, or in abouthalf an hour, it is drawn off. Then rince the corn with cold water, and, having completely drained it, spread it thinly on the floor of a kiln, and thus thoroughly dry it, stirring and turning it frequently duringthis part of the process. "[47]

FOOTNOTES:

[43] The sack of marketable flour is by law obliged to weigh 240 pounds, which is the produce of five bushels of wheat, and is upon an averagesupposed to make eighty quartern loaves of bread; and consequentlysixteen of such loaves are made from each bushel of good wheat. It isadmitted, however, that two or three loaves more than the above quantitycan be made from the sack of flour, when it is the _genuine produce_ of_good wheat_; that is, in the proportion of about sixteen and a halfloaves from each bushel of sound grain, and, it may be presumed, sixteenfrom a bushel of medium corn. The expense, in London, of making the sackof flour into bread, and disposing of it, is about nine shillings. 

A bushel of wheat, upon an average, weighs sixty-one pounds; whenground, the meal weighs 60-3/4 lbs. ; which, on being dressed, produces46-3/4 lbs. Of flour, of the sort called _seconds_; which alone is usedfor the making of bread in London and throughout the greater part ofthis country; and of pollard and bran 12-3/4 lbs. , which quantity, whenbolted, produces 3 lbs. Of fine flour, this, when sifted, produces ingood second flour 1-1/4 lb. 

[44] Whilst correcting this sheet for the press, the printer transmitsto me the following lines:

"On Saturday last, George Wood, a baker, was convicted before T. Evance, Esq. Union Hall, of having in his possession a quantity of alum for theadulteration of bread, and fined in the penalty of 5_l. _ and costs, under 55 Geo. III. C. 99. "--_The Times_, Oct. 1819. 

[45] There are instances of convictions on record, of bakers having usedgypsum, chalk, and pipe clay, in the manufacture of bread. 

[46] See a Practical Treatise on the Use and Application of ChemicalTests, illustrated by experiments, 3d edit. P. 270, 231, 177, & 196. 

[47] Phil. Trans. For 1817, part i. 

_Adulteration of Beer. _

Malt liquors, and particularly porter, the favourite beverage of theinhabitants of London, and of other large towns, is amongst thosearticles, in the manufacture of which the greatest frauds are frequentlycommitted. 

The statute prohibits the brewer from using any ingredients in hisbrewings, except malt and hops; but it too often happens that those whosuppose they are drinking a nutritious beverage, made of theseingredients only, are entirely deceived. The beverage may, in fact, beneither more nor less than a compound of the most deleterioussubstances; and it is also clear that all ranks of society are alikeexposed to the nefarious fraud. The proofs of this statement will beshewn hereafter. [48]

The author[49] of a Practical Treatise on Brewing, which has runthrough eleven editions, after having stated the various ingredients forbrewing porter, observes, "that however much they may surprise, howeverpernicious or disagreeable they may appear, he has always found themrequisite in the brewing of porter, and he thinks they must invariablybe used by those who wish to continue the taste, flavour, and appearanceof the beer. [50] And though several Acts of Parliament have been passedto prevent porter brewers from using many of them, yet the author canaffirm, from experience, he could never produce the present flavouredporter without them. [51] The intoxicating qualities of porter are to beascribed to the various drugs intermixed with it. It is evident someporter is more heady than other, and it arises from the greater or lessquantity of stupifying ingredients. Malt, to produce intoxication, mustbe used in such large quantities as would very much diminish, if nottotally exclude, the brewer's profit. "

The practice of adulterating beer appears to be of early date. By anAct so long ago as Queen Anne, the brewers are prohibited from mixing_cocculus indicus_, or any unwholesome ingredients, in their beer, undersevere penalties: but few instances of convictions under this act are tobe met with in the public records for nearly a century. To shew thatthey have augmented in our own days, we shall exhibit an abstract fromdocuments laid lately before Parliament. [52]

These will not only amply prove, that unwholesome ingredients are usedby fraudulent brewers, and that very deleterious substances are alsovended both to brewers and publicans for adulterating beer, but that theingredients mixed up in the brewer's enchanting cauldron are placedabove all competition, even with the potent charms of Macbeth's witches:

 "Root of hemlock, digg'd i' the dark, + + + + + + + + + + For a charm of pow'rful trouble, Like a hell-broth boil and bubble; Double, double, toil and trouble, Fire burn, and cauldron bubble. "

The fraud of imparting to porter and ale an intoxicating quality bynarcotic substances, appears to have flourished during the period of thelate French war; for, if we examine the importation lists of drugs, itwill be noticed that the quantities of cocculus indicus imported in agiven time prior to that period, will bear no comparison with thequantity imported in the same space of time during the war, although anadditional duty was laid upon this commodity. Such has been the amountbrought into this country in five years, that it far exceeds thequantity imported during twelve years anterior to the above epoch. Theprice of this drug has risen within these ten years from two shillingsto seven shillings the pound. 

It was at the period to which we have alluded, that the preparation ofan extract of cocculus indicus first appeared, as a new saleablecommodity, in the price-currents of _brewers'-druggists_. It was at thesame time, also, that a Mr. Jackson, of notorious memory, fell upon theidea of brewing beer from various drugs, without any malt and hops. Thischemist did not turn brewer himself; but he struck out the moreprofitable trade of teaching his mystery to the brewers for a handsomefee. From that time forwards, written directions, and recipe-books forusing the chemical preparations to be substituted for malt and hops, were respectively sold; and many adepts soon afterwards appeared everywhere, to instruct brewers in the nefarious practice, first pointed outby Mr. Jackson. From that time, also, the fraternity ofbrewers'-chemists took its rise. They made it their chief business tosend travellers all over the country with lists and samples exhibitingthe price and quality of the articles manufactured by them for the useof brewers only. Their trade spread far and wide, but it was amongst thecountry brewers chiefly that they found the most customers; and it isamongst them, up to the present day, as I am assured by some of theseoperators, on whose veracity I can rely, that the greatest quantities ofunlawful ingredients are sold. 

The Act of Parliament[53] prohibits chemists, grocers, and druggists, from supplying illegal ingredients to brewers under a heavy penalty, asis obvious from the following abstract of the Act. 

"No druggist, vender of, or dealer in drugs, or chemist, or otherperson, shall sell or deliver to any licensed brewer, dealer in orretailer of beer, knowing him to be such, or shall sell or deliver toany person on account of or in trust for any such brewer, dealer orretailer, any liquor called by the name of or sold as colouring, fromwhatever material the same may be made, or any material or preparationother than unground brown malt for darkening the colour of worts orbeer, or any liquor or preparation made use of for darkening the colourof worts or beer, or any molasses, honey, vitriol, quassia, cocculusIndian, grains of paradise, Guinea pepper or opium, or any extract orpreparation of molasses, or any article or preparation to be used inworts or beer for or as a substitute for malt or hops; and if anydruggist shall offend in any of these particulars, such liquorpreparation, molasses, &c. Shall be forfeited, and may be seized by anyofficer of excise, and the person so offending shall for each offenceforfeit 500_l. _"

The following is a list of druggists and grocers, prosecuted by theCourt of Excise, and convicted of supplying unlawful ingredients tobrewers. 

_List of Druggists and Grocers, prosecuted and convicted from 1812 to1819, for supplying illegal Ingredients to Brewers for adulteratingBeer. _[54]

John Dunn and another, druggists, for selling adulterating ingredientsto brewers, verdict 500_l. _

George Rugg and others, druggists, for selling adulterating ingredientsto brewers, verdict 500_l. _

John Hodgkinson and others, for selling adulterating ingredients tobrewers, 100_l. _ and costs. 

William Hiscocks and others, for selling adulterating ingredients to abrewer, 200_l. _ and costs. 

G. Hornby; for selling adulterating ingredients to a brewer, 200_l. _

W. Wilson, for selling adulterating ingredients to a brewer, 200_l. _

George Andrews, grocer, for selling adulterating ingredients to abrewer, 25_l. _ and costs. 

Guy Knowles, for selling substitute for hops, costs. 

Kernot and Alsop, for selling cocculus india, &c. 25_l. _

Joseph Moss, for selling various drugs, 300_l. _

Ph. Whitcombe, John Dunn, and Arthur Waller, druggists, for havingliquor for darkening the colour of beer, hid and concealed. 

Isaac Hebberd, for having liquor for darkening the colour of beer, hidand concealed. 

Ph. Whitcombe, John Dunn, and Arthur Waller, druggists, for makingliquor for darkening the colour of beer. 

John Lord, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 20_l. _ and costs. 

John Smith Carr, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 20_l. _ andcosts. 

Edward Fox, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 25_l. _ and costs. 

John Cooper, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 40_l. _ and costs. 

Joseph Bickering, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 40_l. _ andcosts. 

John Howard, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 25_l. _ and costs. 

James Reynolds, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, costs. 

Thomas Hammond, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 20_l. _ andcosts. 

J. Mackway, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, 20_l. _

T. Renton, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, costs, and takingout a license. 

R. Adamson, grocer, for selling molasses to a brewer, costs, and takingout a license. 

W. Weaver, for selling Spanish liquorice to a brewer, 200_l. _

J. Moss, for selling Spanish liquorice to a brewer. 

Alex. Braden, for selling liquorice, 20_l. _

J. Draper, for selling molasses to a brewer, 20_l. _

PORTER. 

The method of brewing porter has not been the same at all times as it isat present. 

At first, the only essential difference in the methods of brewing thisliquor and that of other kinds of beer, was, that porter was brewed frombrown malt only; and this gave to it both the colour and flavourrequired. Of late years it has been brewed from mixtures of pale andbrown malt. 

These, at some establishments, are mashed separately, and the worts fromeach are afterwards mixed together. The proportion of pale and brownmalt, used for brewing porter, varies in different breweries; someemploy nearly two parts of pale malt and one part of brown malt; buteach brewer appears to have his own proportion; which the intelligentmanufacturer varies, according to the nature and qualities of the malt. Three pounds of hops are, upon an average, allowed to every barrel, (thirty-six gallons) of porter. 

When the price of malt, on account of the great increase in the price ofbarley during the late war, was very high, the London brewers discoveredthat a larger quantity of wort of a given strength could be obtainedfrom pale malt than from brown malt. They therefore increased thequantity of the former and diminished that of the latter. This producedbeer of a paler colour, and of a less bitter flavour. To remedy thesedisadvantages, they invented an artificial colouring substance, preparedby boiling brown sugar till it acquired a very dark brown colour; asolution of which was employed to darken the colour of the beer. Somebrewers made use of the infusion of malt instead of sugar colouring. Toimpart to the beer a bitter taste, the fraudulent brewer employedquassia wood and wormwood as a substitute for hops. 

But as the colouring of beer by means of sugar became in many instancesa pretext for using illegal ingredients, the Legislature, apprehensivefrom the mischief that might, and actually did, result from it, passedan Act prohibiting the use of burnt sugar, in July 1817; and nothing butmalt and hops is now allowed to enter into the composition of beer: eventhe use of isinglass for clarifying beer, is contrary to law. 

No sooner had the beer-colouring Act been repealed, than other personsobtained a patent for effecting the purpose of imparting an artificialcolour to porter, by means of brown malt, specifically prepared for thatpurpose only. The beer, coloured by the new method, is more liable tobecome spoiled, than when coloured by the process formerly practised. The colouring malt does not contain any considerable portion ofsaccharine matter. The grain is by mere torrefaction converted into agum-like substance, wholly soluble in water, which renders the beermore liable to pass into the acetous fermentation than the common brownmalt is capable of doing; because the latter, if prepared from goodbarley, contains a portion of saccharine matter, of which the patentmalt is destitute. 

But as brown malt is generally prepared from the worst kind of barley, and as the patent malt can only be made from good grain, it may become, on that account, an useful article to the brewer (at least, it givescolour and body to the beer;) but it cannot materially economise thequantity of malt necessary to produce good porter. Some brewers ofeminence in this town have assured me, that the use of this mode ofcolouring beer is wholly unnecessary; and that porter of the requisitecolour may be brewed better without it; hence this kind of malt is notused in their establishments. The quantity of gum-like matter which itcontains, gives too much ferment to the beer, and renders it liable tospoil. Repeated experiments, made on a large scale, have settled thisfact. 

STRENGTH AND SPECIFIC DIFFERENCES OF DIFFERENT KINDS OF PORTER. 

The strength of all kinds of beer, like that of wine, depends on thequantity of spirit contained in a given bulk of the liquor. 

The reader need scarcely be told, that of no article there are morevarieties than of porter. This, no doubt, arises from the different modeof manufacturing the beer, although the ingredients are the same. Thisdifference is more striking in the porter manufactured among countrybrewers, than it is in the beer brewed by the eminent London porterbrewers. The totality of the London porter exhibits but very slightdifferences, both with respect to strength or quantity of spirit, andsolid extractive matter, contained in a given bulk of it. The spirit maybe stated, upon an average, to be 4, 50 per cent. In porter retailed atthe publicans; the solid matter, is from twenty-one to twenty-threepounds per barrel of thirty-six gallons. The country-brewed porter isseldom well fermented, and seldom contains so large a quantity ofspirit; it usually abounds in mucilage; hence it becomes turbid whenmixed with alcohol. Such beer cannot keep, without becoming sour. 

It has been matter of frequent complaint, that ALL the porternow brewed, is not what porter was formerly. This idea may be true withsome exceptions. My professional occupations have, during thesetwenty-eight years, repeatedly obliged me to examine the strength ofLondon porter, brewed by different brewers; and, from the minutes madeon that subject, I am authorised to state, that the porter now brewed bythe eminent London brewers, is unquestionably stronger than that whichwas brewed at different periods during the late French war. Samples ofbrown stout with which I have been obligingly favoured, whilst writingthis Treatise, by Messrs. Barclay, Perkins, and Co. --Messrs. Truman, Hanbury, and Co. --Messrs. Henry Meux and Co. --and other eminent brewersof this capital--afforded, upon an average, 7, 25 per cent. Of alcohol, of 0, 833 specific gravity; and porter, from the same houses, yieldedupon an average 5, 25 per cent. Of alcohol, of the same specificgravity;[55] this beer received from the brewers was taken from thesame store from which the publicans are supplied. 

It is nevertheless singular to observe, that from fifteen samples ofbeer of the same denominations, procured from different retailers, theproportions of spirit fell considerably short of the above quantities. Samples of brown stout, procured from the retailers, afforded, upon anaverage, 6, 50 per cent. Of alcohol; and the average strength of theporter was 4, 50 per cent. Whence can this difference between the beerfurnished by the brewer, and that retailed by the publican, arise? Weshall not be at a loss to answer this question, when we find that somany retailers of porter have been prosecuted and convicted for mixingtable beer with their strong beer; this is prohibited by law, as becomesobvious by the following words of the Act. [56]

"If any common or other brewer, innkeeper, victualler, or retailer ofbeer or ale, shall mix or suffer to be mixed any strong beer, ale, orworts, with table beer, worts, or water, in any tub or measure, he shallforfeit 50_l. _" The difference between strong and table beer, is thussettled by Parliament. 

"All beer or ale[57] above the price of eighteen shillings per barrel, exclusive of ale duties now payable (viz. Ten shillings per barrel, ) orthat may be hereafter payable in respect thereof, shall be deemed strongbeer or ale; and all beer of the price of eighteen shillings the barrelor under, exclusive of the duty payable (viz. Two shillings per barrel)in respect thereof, shall be deemed table beer within the meaning ofthis and all other Acts now in force, or that may hereafter be passed inrelation to beer or ale or any duties thereon. "

_List of Publicans prosecuted and convicted from 1815 to 1818, foradulterating Beer with illegal Ingredients, and for mixing Table Beerwith their Strong Beer. _[58]

William Atterbury, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 40_l. _

Richard Dean, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 50_l. _

John Jay, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixingtable beer with strong beer, 50_l. _

James Atkinson, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 20_l. _

Samuel Langworth, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 50_l. _

Hannah Spencer, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 150_l. _

---- Hoeg, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixingtable beer with strong beer, 5_l. _

Richard Craddock, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing table beer with strong beer, 100_l. _

James Harris, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And forreceiving stale beer, and mixing it with strong beer, 42_l. _ and costs. 

Thomas Scoons, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing stale beer with strong beer, verdict 200_l. _

Diones Geer and another, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 400_l. _

Charles Coleman, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing strong and table beer, 35_l. _ and costs. 

William Orr, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixingstrong and table beer, 50_l. _

John Gardiner, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And formixing strong and table beer, 100_l. _

John Morris, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixingstrong and table beer, 20_l. _

John Harbur, for using salt of steel, salt, molasses, &c. And for mixingstrong and table beer, 50_l. _

John Corrie, for mixing strong beer with table beer. 

John Cape, for mixing strong beer with table beer. 

Joseph Gudge, for mixing strong beer with small beer. 

ILLEGAL SUBSTANCES USED FOR ADULTERATING BEER. 

We have stated already (p. 113) that nothing is allowed by law to enterinto the composition of beer, but malt and hops. 

The substances used by fraudulent brewers for adulterating beer, arechiefly the following:

Quassia, which gives to beer a bitter taste, is substituted for hops;but hops possesses a more agreeable aromatic flavour, and there is alsoreason to believe that they render beer less liable to spoil by keeping;a property which does not belong to quassia. It requires but littlediscrimination to distinguish very clearly the peculiar bitterness ofquassia in adulterated porter. Vast quantities of the shavings of thiswood are sold in a half-torrefied and ground state to disguise itsobvious character, and to prevent its being recognised among the wastematerials of the brewers. Wormwood[59] has likewise been used byfraudulent brewers. 

The adulterating of hops is prohibited by the Legislature. [60]

"If any person shall put any drug or ingredient whatever into hops toalter the colour or scent thereof, every person so offending, convictedby the oath of one witness before one justice of peace for the county orplace where the offence was committed, shall forfeit 5_l. _ for everyhundred weight. "

Beer rendered bitter by quassia never keeps well, unless it be kept in aplace possessing a temperature considerably lower than the temperatureof the surrounding atmosphere; and this is not well practicable in largeestablishments. 

The use of boiling the wort of beer with hops, is partly to communicatea peculiar aromatic flavour which the hop contains, partly to cover thesweetness of undecomposed saccharine matter, and also to separate, byvirtue of the gallic acid and tannin it contains, a portion of apeculiar vegetable mucilage somewhat resembling gluten, which is stilldiffused through the beer. The compound thus produced, separates insmall flakes like those of curdled soap; and by these means the beer isrendered less liable to spoil. For nothing contributes more to theconversion of beer, or any other vinous fluid, into vinegar, thanmucilage. Hence, also, all full-bodied and clammy ales, abounding inmucilage, and which are generally ill fermented, do not keep as perfectale ought to do. Quassia is, therefore, unfit as a substitute for hops;and even English hops are preferable to those imported from theContinent; for nitrate of silver and acetate of lead produce a moreabundant precipitate from an infusion of English hops, than can beobtained from a like infusion by the same agents from foreign hops. 

One of the qualities of good porter, is, that it should bear _a finefrothy head_, as it is technically termed: because professed judges ofthis beverage, would not pronounce the liquor excellent, although itpossessed all other good qualities of porter, without this requisite. 

To impart to porter this property of frothing when poured from onevessel into another, or to produce what is also termed a _cauliflowerhead_, the mixture called _beer-heading_, composed of common greenvitriol (sulphate of iron, ) alum, and salt, is added. This addition tothe beer is generally made by the publicans. [61] It is unnecessary togenuine beer, which of itself possesses the property of bearing a strongwhite froth, without these additions; and it is only in consequence oftable beer being mixed with strong beer, that the frothing property ofthe porter is lost. From experiments I have tried on this subject, Ihave reason to believe that the sulphate of iron, added for thatpurpose, does not possess the power ascribed to it. But the publicansfrequently, when they fine a butt of beer, by means of isinglass, adulterate the porter at the same time with table beer, together with aquantity of molasses and a small portion of extract of gentian root, tokeep up the peculiar flavour of the porter; and it is to the molasseschiefly, which gives a spissitude to the beer, that the frothingproperty must be ascribed; for, without it, the sulphate of iron doesnot produce the property of frothing in diluted beer. 

Capsicum and grains of paradise, two highly acrid substances, areemployed to give a pungent taste to weak insipid beer. Of late, aconcentrated tincture of these articles, to be used for a similarpurpose, and possessing a powerful effect, has appeared in theprice-currents of brewers' druggists. Ginger root, coriander seed, andorange peels, are employed as flavouring substances chiefly by the alebrewers. 

From these statements, and the seizures that have been made of illegalingredients at various breweries, it is obvious that the adulterationsof beer are not imaginary. It will be noticed, however, that some of thesophistications are comparatively harmless, whilst others are effectedby substances deleterious to health. 

The following list exhibits some of the unlawful substances seized atdifferent breweries and at chemical laboratories. 

_List of Illegal Ingredients, seized from 1812 to 1818, at variousBreweries and Brewers' Druggists. _[62]

1812, July. Josiah Nibbs, at Tooting, Surrey. 

 Multum 84 lbs. Cocculus indicus 12 Colouring 4 galls. Honey about 180 lbs. Hartshorn Shavings 14 Spanish Juice 46 Orange Powder 17 Ginger 56

Penalty 300_l. _

1813, June 13. Sarah Willis, at West Ham, Essex. 

 Cocculus indicus 1 lb. Spanish Juice 12 Hartshorn Shavings 6 Orange Powder 1

Penalty 200_l. _

August 3. Cratcherode Whiffing, Limehouse. 

 Grains of Paradise 44 lbs. Quassia 10 Liquorice 64 Ginger 80 Caraway Seeds 40 Orange Powder 14 Copperas 4

Penalty 200_l. _

Nov. 25. Elizabeth Hasler, at Stratford. 

 Cocculus indicus 12 lbs. Multum 26 Grains of Paradise 12 Spanish Juice 30 Orange Powder 3

Penalty 200_l. _

Dec. 14. John Abbott, at Canterbury, Kent. 

 Copperas, &c. 14 lbs. Orange powder 2

Penalty 500_l. _, and Crown's costs. 

Proof of using drugs at various times. 

1815, Feb. 15. Mantel and Cook, Castle-street, Bloomsbury-square. 

Proof of mixing strong with table beer, and using colouring and otherthings. 

Compromised for 300_l. _

1817. From Peter Stevenson, an old Servant to Dunn and Waller, St. John-street, brewers' druggists. 

 Cocculus Indicus Extract 6 lbs. Multum 560 Capsicum 88 Copperas 310 Quassia 150 Colouring and Drugs 84 Mixed Drugs 240 Spanish Liquorice 420 Hartshorn Shavings 77 Liquorice Powder 175 Orange powder 126 Caraway Seeds 100 Ginger 110 Ginger Root 176

Condemned, not being claimed. 

July 30. Luke Lyons, Shadwell. 

 Capsicum 1 lb Liquorice Root Powder 2 Coriander Seed 2 Copperas 1 Orange Powder 8 Spanish Liquorice 1/2 Beer Colouring 24 galls

Not tried. (7th May, 1818. )

Aug. 6. John Gray, at West Ham. 

 Multum 4 lbs. Spanish Liquorice 21 Liquorice Root Powder 113 Ginger 116 Honey 11

Penalty, 300_l. _, and costs; including mixing strong beer with table, and paying table-beer duty for strong beer, &c. 

 * * * * *

Numerous other seizures of illegal substances, made at breweries, mightbe advanced, were it necessary to enlarge this subject to a greaterextent. 

Mr. James West, from the excise office, being asked in the Committee ofthe House of Commons, appointed, 1819, to examine and report on thepetition of several inhabitants of London, complaining of the high priceand inferior quality of beer, produced the following seizedarticles:--"One bladder of honey, one bladder of extract of cocculusindicus, ground guinea pepper or capsicum, vitriol or copperas, orangepowder, quassia, ground beer-heading, hard multum, another kind ofmultum or beer preparation, liquorice powder, and ground grains ofparadise. "

Witness being asked "Where did you seize these things?" Answer, "Some ofthem were seized from brewers, and some of them from brewers'druggists, within these two years past. " (May 8, 1818. )

Another fraud frequently committed, both by brewers and publicans, (asis evident from the Excise Report, ) is the practice of adulteratingstrong beer with small beer--This fraud is prohibited by law, since boththe revenue and the public suffer by it. [63] "The duty upon strong beeris ten shillings a barrel; and upon table beer it is two shillings. Therevenue suffers, because a larger quantity of beer is sold as strongbeer; that is, at a price exceeding the price of table beer, without thestrong beer duty being paid. In the next place, the brewer suffers, because the retailer gets table or mild beer, and retails it as strongbeer. " The following are the words of the Act, prohibiting the brewersmixing table beer with strong beer. 

"If any common brewer shall mix or suffer to be mixed any strong beer, or strong worts with table beer or table worts, or with water in anyguile or fermenting tun after the declaration of the quantity of suchguile shall have been made; or if he shall at any time mix or suffer tobe mixed strong beer or strong worts with table beer worts or withwater, in any vat, cask, tub, measures or utensil, not being an enteredguile or fermenting tun, he shall forfeit 200 pounds. "[64]

With respect to the persons who commit this offence, Mr. Carr, [65] theSolicitor of the Excise, observes, that "they are generally brewers whocarry on the double trade of brewing both strong and table beer. It isalmost impossible to prevent them from mixing one with the other; andfrauds of very great extent have been detected, and the parties punishedfor that offence. One brewer at Plymouth evaded duties to the amount of32, 000 pounds; and other brewers, who brew party guiles of beer, carrying on the two trades of ale and table beer brewers, where thetrade is a victualling brewer, which is different from the commonbrewer, he being a person who sells only wholesale; the victuallingbrewer being a brewer and also a seller by retail. "

"In the neighbourhood of London, " Mr. Carr continues, "moreparticularly, I speak from having had great experience, from theinformations and evidence which I have received, that the retailerscarry on a most extensive fraud upon the public, in purchasing staletable beer, or the bottoms of casks. There are a class of men who goabout and sell such beer at table-beer price to public victuallers, whomix it in their cellars. If they receive beer from their brewers whichis mild, they purchase stale beer; and if they receive stale beer, theypurchase common table beer for that purpose; and many of theprosecutions are against retailers for that offence. " The following mayserve in proof of this statement. 

_List of Brewers prosecuted and convicted from 1813 to 1819, foradulterating Strong Beer with Table Beer. _[66]

Thomas Manton and another, brewers, for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 300_l. _

Mark Morrell and another, brewers, for mixing strong and table beer, 20_l. _ and costs. 

Robert Jones and another, brewers, for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 125_l. _

Robert Stroad, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, 200_l. _ andcosts. 

William Cobbett, brewer, mixing strong and table beer, 100_l. _ andcosts. 

Thomas Richard Withers, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, 75_l. _and costs. 

John Cowel, brewer, for mixing table beer with strong, 50_l. _ and costs. 

John Mitchell, brewer, for mixing table beer with strong, absconded. 

George Lloyd and another, brewers, for mixing table beer with strong, 25_l. _ and costs. 

James Edmunds and another, brewers, for mixing table beer with strong, for a long period, verdict 600_l. _

John Hoffman, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, and usingmolasses, 130_l. _ and costs. 

Samuel Langworth, brewer, for mixing strong with stale table beer, 10_l. _ and costs. 

Hannah Spencer, brewer, for mixing strong with stale table beer, verdict150_l. _

Joseph Smith and others, brewers, for mixing strong and table beer. 

Philip George, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 200_l. _

Joshua Row, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 400_l. _

John Drew, jun. And another, for mixing strong beer with table, 50_l. _and costs. 

John Cape, brewer, for mixing strong and table beer, 250_l. _ and costs. 

John Williams and another, brewers, for mixing strong and table beer, verdict 200_l. _

OLD, OR ENTIRE; AND NEW, OR MILD BEER. 

It is necessary to state, that every publican has two sorts of beer sentto him from the brewer; the one is called _mild_, which is beer sent outfresh as it is brewed; the other is called _old_; that is, such as isbrewed on purpose for keeping, and which has been kept in store atwelve-month or eighteen months. The origin of the beer called_entire_, is thus related by the editor of the Picture of London:"Before the year 1730, the malt liquors in general used in London wereale, beer, and two-penny; and it was customary to call for a pint, ortankard, of half-and-half, _i. E. _ half of ale and half of beer, half ofale and half of two-penny. In course of time it also became the practiceto call for a pint or tankard of _three-threads_, meaning a third ofale, beer, and two-penny; and thus the publican had the trouble to go tothree casks, and turn three cocks, for a pint of liquor. To avoid thisinconvenience and waste, a brewer of the name of Harwood conceived theidea of making a liquor, which should partake of the same unitedflavours of ale, beer, and two-penny; he did so, and succeeded, callingit _entire_, or entire butt, meaning that it was drawn entirely from onecask or butt; and as it was a very hearty and nourishing liquor, andsupposed to be very suitable for porters and other working people, itobtained the name of _porter_. " The system is now altered, and porter isvery generally compounded of two kinds, or rather the same liquor in twodifferent states, the due admixture of which is palatable, thoughneither is good alone. One is _mild_ porter, and the other _stale_porter; the former is that which has a slightly bitter flavour; thelatter has been kept longer. This mixture the publican adapts to thepalates of his several customers, and effects the mixture very readily, by means of a machine, containing small pumps worked by handles. Inthese are four pumps, but only three spouts, because two of the pumpsthrow out at the same spout: one of these two pumps draws the mild, andthe other the stale porter, from the casks down in the cellar; and thepublican, by dexterously changing his hold works either pump, and drawsboth kinds of beer at the same spout. An indifferent observer supposes, that since it all comes from one spout, it is entire butt beer, as thepublican professes over his door, and which has been decided by vulgarprejudice to be only good porter, though the difference is not easilydistinguished. I have been informed by several eminent brewers, that oflate, a far greater quantity is consumed of mild than of stale beer. 

The entire beer of the modern brewer, according to the statement of C. Barclay, [67] Esq. "consists of some beer brewed expressly for thepurpose of keeping: it likewise contains a portion of returns frompublicans; a portion of beer from the bottoms of vats; the beer that isdrawn off from the pipes, which convey the beer from one vat to another, and from one part of the premises to another. This beer is collected andput into vats. Mr. Barclay also states that it contains a certainportion of brown stout, which is twenty shillings a barrel dearer thancommon beer; and some bottling beer, which is ten shillings a barreldearer;[68] and that all these beers, united, are put into vats, andthat it depends upon various circumstances, how long they may remain inthose vats before they become perfectly bright. When bright, this beeris sent out to the publicans, for their _entire_ beer, and there issometimes a small quantity of mild beer mixed with it. "

The present entire beer, therefore, is a very heterogeneous mixture, composed of all the waste and spoiled beer of the publicans--the bottomsof butts--the leavings of the pots--the drippings of the machines fordrawing the beer--the remnants of beer that lay in the leaden pipes ofthe brewery, with a portion of brown stout, bottling beer, and mildbeer. 

The old or _entire_ beer we have examined, as obtained from Messrs. Barclay's, and other eminent London brewers, is unquestionably a goodcompound; but it does no longer appear to be necessary, among fraudulentbrewers, to brew beer on purpose for keeping, or to keep it twelve oreighteen months. A more easy, expeditious, and economical method hasbeen discovered to convert any sort of beer into entire beer, merely bythe admixture of a portion of sulphuric acid. An imitation of the age ofeighteen months is thus produced in an instant. This process istechnically called to bring beer _forward_, or to make it _hard_. 

The practice is a bad one. The genuine, old, or entire beer, of thehonest brewer, is quite a different compound; it has a rich, generous, full-bodied taste, without being acid, and a vinous odour: but it may, perhaps, not be generally known that this kind of beer always affords aless proportion of alcohol than is produced from mild beer. The practiceof bringing beer _forward_, it is to be understood, is resorted to onlyby fraudulent brewers. [69]

If, on the contrary, the brewer has too large a stock of old beer on hishands, recourse is had to an opposite practice of converting stale, half-spoiled, or sour beer, into mild beer, by the simple admixture ofan alkali, or an alkaline earth. Oyster-shell powder and subcarbonate ofpotash, or soda, are usually employed for that purpose. These substancesneutralise the excess of acid, and render sour beer somewhat palatable. By this process the beer becomes very liable to spoil. 

It is the worst expedient that the brewer can practise: the beer thusrendered _mild_, soon loses its vinous taste; it becomes vapid; andspeedily assumes a muddy grey colour, and an exceedingly disagreeabletaste. 

These sophistications may be considered, at first, as minor crimespractised by fraudulent brewers, when compared with the methods employedby them for rendering beer noxious to health by substances absolutelyinjurious. 

To increase the intoxicating quality of beer, the deleterious vegetablesubstance, called _cocculus indicus_, and the extract of this poisonousberry, technically called _black extract_, or, by some, _hard multum_, are employed. Opium, tobacco, nux vomica, and extract of poppies, havealso been used. 

This fraud constitutes by far the most censurable offence committed byunprincipled brewers; and it is a lamentable reflection to behold sogreat a number of brewers prosecuted and convicted of this crime; nor isit less deplorable to find the names of druggists, eminent in trade, implicated in the fraud, by selling the unlawful ingredients to brewersfor fraudulent purposes. 

_List of Brewers prosecuted and convicted from 1813 to 1819, forreceiving and using illegal Ingredients in their Brewings. _[70]

Richard Gardner, brewer, for using adulterating ingredients, 100_l. _, judgment by default. 

Stephen Webb and another, brewers, for using adulterating ingredients, and mixing strong and table beer, verdict 500_l. _

Henry Wyatt, brewer, for using adulterating ingredients, verdict 400_l. _

John Harbart, retailer, for receiving adulterating ingredients, verdict150_l. _

Philip Blake and others, brewers, for using adulterating ingredients, and mixing strong and table beer, verdict 250_l. _

James Sneed, for receiving adulterating ingredients, 25_l. _ and costs. 

John Rewell and another, brewers, ditto, verdict 100_l. _

John Swain and another, ditto, for using adulterating ingredients, verdict 200_l. _

John Ing, brewer, ditto, stayed on defendant's death. 

John Hall, ditto, for receiving adulterating ingredients, 5_l. _ andcosts. 

John Webb, retailer, for using adulterating ingredients. 

Ralph Fogg and another, brewers, for receiving and using adulteratingingredients. 

John Gray, brewer, for using adulterating ingredients, 300_l. _ andcosts. 

Richard Bowman, for using liquid in bladder, supposed to be extract ofcocculus, 100_l. _

Richard Bowman, brewer, for ditto, 100_l. _ and costs. 

Septimus Stephens, brewer, for ditto, verdict 50_l. _

James Rogers and another, brewer, for ditto, 220_l. _ and costs. 

George Moore, brewer, for using colouring, 300_l. _ and costs. 

John Morris, for using adulterating ingredients. 

Webb and Ball, for using ginger, Guinea pepper, and brown powder, (nameunknown), 1st 100_l. _ 2nd 500_l. _

Henry Clarke, for using molasses, 150_l. _

Kewell and Burrows, for using cocculus india, multum, &c. 100_l. _

Allatson and Abraham, for using cocculus india, multum, and porterflavour, 630_l. _

Swain and Sewell, for using cocculus india, Guinea-opium, &c. 200_l. _

John Ing, for using cocculus india, hard colouring, and honey, _dead_. 

William Dean, for using molasses, 50_l. _

John Cowell, for using Spanish-liquorice, and mixing table beer withstrong beer, 50_l. _

John Mitchell, for using cocculus india, vitriol, and Guinea pepper, _left the country_. 

Lloyd and Man, for using extract of cocculus, 25_l. _

John Gray, for using ginger, hartshorn shavings, and molasses, 300_l. _

Jon Hoffman, for using molasses, Spanish juice, and mixing table withstrong beer, 130_l. _

Rogers and Boon, for using extract of cocculus, multum, porter flavour, &c. 220_l. _

---- Betteley, for using wormwood, coriander seed, and Spanish juice, 200_l. _

William Lane, brewer, for using wormwood instead of hops, 5_l. _ andcosts. 

 * * * * *

That a minute portion of an unwholesome ingredient, daily taken in beer, cannot fail to be productive of mischief, admits of no doubt; and thereis reasons to believe that a small quantity of a narcotic substance (andcocculus indicus is a powerful narcotic[71]), daily taken into thestomach, together with an intoxicating liquor, is highly moreefficacious than it would be without the liquor. The effect may begradual; and a strong constitution, especially if it be assisted withconstant and hard labour, may counteract the destructive consequencesperhaps for many years; but it never fails to shew its baneful effectsat last. Independent of this, it is a well-established fact, that porterdrinkers are very liable to apoplexy and palsy, without taking thisnarcotic poison. 

If we judge from the preceding lists of prosecutions and convictionsfurnished by the Solicitor of the Excise[72], it will be evident thatmany wholesale brewers, as well as retail dealers, stand veryconspicuous among those offenders. But the reader will likewise notice, that there are no convictions, in any instance, against any of theeleven great London porter brewers[73] for any illegal practice. Thegreat London brewers, it appears, believe that the publicans aloneadulterate the beer. That many of the latter have been convicted of thisfraud, the Report of the Board of Excise amply shews. --See p. 129. 

The following statement relating to this subject, we transcribe from aParliamentary document:[74]

Mr. Perkins being asked, whether he believed that any of the inferiorbrewers adulterated beer, answered, "I am satisfied there are someinstances of that. "

_Question. _--"Do you believe publicans do?" _Answer. _--"I believe theydo. " _Q. _--"To a great extent?" _A. _--"Yes. " _Q. _--"Do you believe theyadulterate the beer you sell them?" _A. _--"I am satisfied there aresome instances of that. "--Mr. J. Martineau[75] being asked the following

_Question. _[76]--"In your judgment is any of the beer of the metropolis, as retailed to the publican, mixed with any deleterious ingredients?"

_Answer. _--"In retailing beer, in some instances, it has been. "

_Question. _--"By whom, in your opinion, has that been done?"

_Answer. _--"In that case by the publicans who vend it. "

On this point, it is but fair, to the minor brewers, to record also theanswers of some officers of the revenue, when they were asked whetherthey considered it more difficult to detect nefarious practices in largebreweries than in small ones. 

Mr. J. Rogers being thus questioned in the Committee of the House ofCommons, [77] "Supposing the large brewers to use deleterious or anyillegal ingredients to such an amount as could be of any importance totheir concern, do you think it would, or would not, be more easy todetect it in those large breweries, than in small ones?" his answer was, "more difficult to detect it in the large ones:" and witness being askedto state the reason why, answered, "Their premises are so much larger, and there is so much more strength, that a cart load or two is got ridof in a minute or two. " Witness "had known, in five minutes, twentybarrels of molasses got rid of as soon as the door was shut. "

Another witness, W. Wells, an excise officer, [78] in describing thecontrivances used to prevent detection, stated, that at a brewer's, atWestham, the adulterating substances "were not kept on the premises, butin the brewer's house; not the principal, but the working brewers; itnot being considered, when there, as liable to seizure: the brewer had avery large jacket made expressly for that purpose, with very largepockets; and, on brewing mornings, he would take his pockets full of thedifferent ingredients. Witness supposed that such a man's jacket, similar to what he had described, would convey quite sufficient for anybrewery in England, as to _cocculus indicus_. "

That it may be more difficult for the officers of the excise to detectfraudulent practices in large breweries than in small ones, may be trueto a certain extent: but what eminent London porter brewer would stakehis reputation on the chance of so paltry a gain, in which he wouldinevitably be at the mercy of his own man? The eleven great porterbrewers of this metropolis are persons of so high respectability, thatthere is no ground for the slightest suspicion that they would attemptany illegal practices, which they were aware could not possibly escapedetection in their extensive establishments. And let it be remembered, that none of them have been detected for any unlawful practices, [79]with regard to the processes of their manufacture, or the adulterationof their beer. 

METHOD OF DETECTING THE ADULTERATION OF BEER. 

The detection of the adulteration of beer with deleterious vegetablesubstances is beyond the reach of chemical analysis. The presence ofsulphate of iron (p. 134) may be detected by evaporating the beer toperfect dryness, and burning away the vegetable matter obtained, by theaction of chlorate of pot-ash in a red-hot crucible. The sulphate ofiron will be left behind among the residue in the crucible, which whendissolved in water, may be assayed, for the constituent parts of thesalt, namely, iron and sulphuric acid: for the former, by tincture ofgalls, ammonia, and prussiate of potash; and for the latter, by muriateof barytes. [80]

Beer, which has been rendered fraudulently _hard_ (see p. 148) by theadmixture of sulphuric acid, affords a white precipitate (sulphate ofbarytes), by dropping into it a solution of acetate or muriate ofbarytes; and this precipitate, when collected by filtering the mass, andafter having been dried, and heated red-hot for a few minutes in aplatina crucible, does not disappear by the addition of nitric, ormuriatic acid. Genuine old beer may produce a precipitate; but theprecipitate which it affords, after having been made red-hot in aplatina crucible, instantly becomes re-dissolved with effervescence bypouring on it some pure nitric or muriatic acid; in that case theprecipitate is malate (not sulphate) of barytes, and is owing to aportion of malic acid having been formed in the beer. 

But with regard to the vegetable materials deleterious to health, it isextremely difficult, in any instance, to detect them by chemicalagencies; and in most cases it is quite impossible, as in that ofcocculus indicus in beer. 

METHOD OF ASCERTAINING THE QUANTITY OF SPIRIT CONTAINED IN PORTER, ALE, OR OTHER KINDS OF MALT LIQUORS. 

Take any quantity of the beer, put it into a glass retort, furnishedwith a receiver, and distil, with a gentle heat, as long as any spiritpasses over into the receiver; which may be known by heating from timeto time a small quantity of the obtained fluid in a tea-spoon over acandle, and bringing into contact with the vapour of it the flame of apiece of paper. If the vapour of the distilled fluid catches fire, thedistillation must be continued until the vapour ceases to be set onfire by the contact of a flaming body. To the distilled liquid thusobtained, which is the spirit of the beer, combined with water, add, insmall quantities at a time, pure subcarbonate of potash (previouslyfreed from water by having been exposed to a red heat, ) till the lastportion of this salt added, remains undissolved in the fluid. The spiritwill thus become separated from the water, because the subcarbonate ofpotash abstracts from it the whole of the water which it contained; andthis combination sinks to the bottom, and the spirit alone floats on thetop. If this experiment be made in a glass tube, about half orthree-quarters of an inch in diameter, and graduated into 50 or 100equal parts, the relative per centage of spirit in a given quantity ofbeer may be seen by mere inspection. 

_Quantity of Alcohol contained in Porter, Ale, and other kinds of MaltLiquors. _[81]

 One hundred parts, by Measure, Parts of Alcohol, contained. By Measure. 

 Ale, home-brewed 8, 30 Ale, Burton, three Samples 6, 25 Ale, Burton[82] 8, 88 Ale, Edinburgh[82] 6, 20 Ale, Dorchester[82] 5, 50 Ale, common London-brewed, } six samples } 5, 82 Ale, Scotch, three samples 5, 75 Porter, London, eight samples 4, 00 Ditto, Ditto[83] 4, 20 Ditto, Ditto[83] 4, 45 Ditto, Ditto, bottled. 4, 75 Brown Stout, four samples 5 Ditto, Ditto[83] 6, 80 Small Beer, six samples 0, 75 Ditto, Ditto[84] 1, 28

FOOTNOTES:

[48] See pages 119, &c. 

[49] Child, on Brewing Porter, p. 7. 

[50] Child, on Brewing Porter, p. 16. 

[51] Ibid. P. 16. 

[52] "Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, to whom thepetition of several inhabitants of London and its vicinity, complainingof the high price and inferior quality of beer, was referred, to examinethe matter thereof, and to report the same, with their observationsthereupon, to the House. Printed by order of the House of Commons, April, 1819. "

[53] 56 Geo. III. C. 2. 

[54] Copied from the Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed for examining the price and quality of Beer. --See pages 18, 29, 30, 31, 36, 43. 

[55] The average specific gravity of different samples of brown stout, obtained direct from the breweries of Messrs. Barclay, Perkins, and Co. Messrs. Truman, Hanbury, and Co. Messrs. Henry Meux and Co. And fromseveral other eminent London brewers, amounted to 1, 022; and the averagespecific gravity of porter, from the same breweries, 1, 018. 

[56] 2 Geo. III. C. 14, § 2. 

[57] 59 Geo. III. C. 53, § 25. 

[58] Copied from the Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed for examining the price and quality of beer, p. 19, 29, 36, 37, 43. 

[59] See Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons for reportingon the Price and Quality of Beer, 1819, p. 29. 

[60] 7 Geo. II. C. 19, § 2. 

[61] See List of Publicans prosecuted and convicted for mixing tablebeer with strong beer, &c. P. 129. 

"Alum gives likewise a smack of age to beer, and is penetrating to thepalate. "--_S. Child on Brewing. _

[62] Copied from the Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed for examining the price and quality of beer, p. 38. 

[63] See Mr. Carr's evidence in the Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 32. 

[64] 42 George III, c. 38, § 12. 

[65] See Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 32. 

[66] Copied from the minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed for examining the price and quality of Beer, 1819, p. 29, 36, 43. 

[67] See the Parliamentary Minutes, p. 94. 

[68] Mr. Barclay has not specified the relative proportions of brownstout and of bottling beer which are introduced at such an augmentationof expense. 

[69] Mr. Child, in his Treatise on Brewing, p. 23 directs, _to make newbeer older, use oil of vitriol_. 

[70] Copied from the Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commonsappointed for examining the price and quality of beer, p. 29, 36. 

[71] The deleterious effect of Cocculus Indicus (the fruit of thememispermum cocculus) is owing to a peculiar bitter principle containedin it; which, when swallowed in minute quantities, intoxicates and actsas poison. It may be obtained from cocculus indicus berries in adetached state:--chemists call it picrotoxin, from +pichros+, bitter;and +toxichon+ poison. 

[72] See Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 28, 36. 

[73] Messrs. Barclay, Perkins, and Co. --Truman, Hanbury and Co. --Reidand Co. --Whitbread and Co. --Combe, Delafield, and Co. --Henry Meux, andCo. --Calvert and Co. --Goodwin and Co. --Elliot and Co. --Taylor andCo. --Cox, and Camble and Co. 

See the Minutes, before quoted, p. 32. 

[74] _Ibid. _ p. 58. 

[75] A partner in the brewery of Messrs. Whitbread and Co. 

[76] Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 104. 

[77] Minutes, before quoted, p. 22. 

[78] Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 40. 

[79] Minutes of the House of Commons, p. 32

[80] See a Treatise on the Use and Application of Chemical Tests, 3dedition; Tests for Sulphuric Acid, &c. 

[81] Repository of Arts, No. 2, p. 74. --1816. 

[82] Copied from Professor Brande's Paper in the PhilosophicalTransactions, 1811, p. 345. 

[83] Result of our own Experiments, see p. 127. 

[84] Professor Brande's Experiments. 

_Counterfeit Tea-Leaves. _

The late detections that have been made respecting the illicitestablishments for the manufacture of imitation tea leaves, arrested, not long ago, the attention of the public; and the parties by whom thesemanufactories were conducted, together with the numerous venders of thefactitious tea, did not escape the hand of justice. In proof of thisstatement, it is only necessary to consult the London newspapers (theTimes and the Courier) from March to July 1818; which show to whatextent this nefarious traffic has been carried on; and they report alsothe prosecutions and convictions of numerous individuals who have beenguilty of the fraud. The following are some of those prosecutions andconvictions. 

HATTON GARDEN. --On Saturday an information came to be heard atthis office, before Thomas Leach, Esq. The sitting magistrate, against aman of the name of Edmund Rhodes, charged with having, on the 12th ofAugust last, dyed, fabricated, and manufactured, divers largequantities, viz. One hundred weight of sloe leaves, one hundred weightof ash leaves, one hundred weight of elder leaves, and one hundredweight of the leaves of a certain other tree, in imitation of tea, contrary to the statute of the 17th of Geo. III. [85] whereby the saidEdmund Rhodes had, for every pound of such leaves so manufactured, forfeited the sum of 5_l. _ making the total of the penalties amount to2, 000_l. _ The second count in the information charged the said Rhodeswith having in his possession the above quantity of sloe, ash, elder, and other leaves, under the like penalty of 2, 000_l. _ The third countcharged him with having, on the said 12th of August last, in hispossession, divers quantities, exceeding six pounds weight of eachrespective kind of leaves; viz. Fifty pounds weight of green sloeleaves, fifty pounds weight of green leaves of ash, fifty pounds weightof green leaves of elder, and fifty pounds weight of the green leaves ofa certain other tree; not having proved that such leaves were gatheredwith the consent of the owners of the trees and shrubs from which theywere taken, and that such leaves were gathered for some other use, andnot for the purpose of manufacturing the same in imitation of tea;whereby he had forfeited for each pound weight, the sum of 5_l. _amounting in the whole to 1, 000_l. _; and, in default of payment, in eachcase, subjected himself to be committed to the house of correction fornot more than twelve months, nor less than six months. 

Mr. Denton, who appeared for the defendant, who was absent, said that hewas a very poor man, with a family of five children, and was only theservant of the real manufacturer, and an ignorant man from the country, put into the premises to carry on the business, without knowing what theleaves were intended for. By direction of Mr. Mayo, who conducted theprosecution, several barrels and bags, filled with the imitation tea, were then brought into the office, and a sample from each handed round. To the eye they seemed a good imitation of tea. 

The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 500_l. _ on the secondcount. 

_The Attorney-General against Palmer. _--This was an action by theAttorney-General against the defendant, Palmer, charging him withhaving in his possession a quantity of sloe-leaves and white-thornleaves, fabricated into an imitation of tea. 

Mr. Dauncey stated the case to the jury, and observed that thedefendant, Mr. Palmer, was a grocer. It would appear that a regularmanufactory was established in Goldstone-street. The parties by whom themanufactory was conducted, was a person of the name of Proctor, andanother person named J. Malins. They engaged others to furnish them withleaves, which, after undergoing a certain process, were sold to anddrank by the public as tea. The leaves, in order to be converted into anarticle resembling black tea, were first boiled, then baked upon an ironplate; and, when dry, rubbed with the hand, in order to produce thatcurl which the genuine tea had. This was the most wholesome part of theoperation; for the colour which was yet to be given to it, was producedby logwood. The green tea was manufactured in a manner more destructiveto the constitution of those by whom it was drank. The leaves, beingpressed and dried, were laid upon sheets of copper, where they receivedtheir colour from an article known by the name of Dutch pink. Thearticle used in producing the appearance of the fine green bloom, observable on the China tea, was, however, decidedly a dead poison! Healluded to verdigris, which was added to the Dutch pink in order tocomplete the operation. This was the case which he had to bring beforethe jury; and hence it would appear, that, at the moment they weresupposing they were drinking a pleasant and nutritious beverage, theywere, in fact, in all probability, drinking the produce of the hedgesround the metropolis, prepared for the purposes of deception in the mostnoxious manner. He trusted he should be enabled to trace to thepossession of the defendant eighty pounds weight of the commodity he hadbeen describing. 

Thomas Jones deposed, that he knew Proctor, and was employed by him atthe latter end of April, 1817, to gather black and white thorn leaves. Sloe leaves were the black thorn. Witness also knew John Malins, the sonof William Malins, a coffee-roaster; he did not at first know thepurpose for which the leaves were gathered, but afterwards learnt theywere to make imitation tea. Witness did not gather more than one hundredand a half weight of these leaves; but he employed another person, ofthe name of John Bagster, to gather them. He had two-pence per pound forthem. They were first boiled, and the water squeezed from them in apress. They were afterwards placed over a slow-fire upon sheets ofcopper to dry; while on the copper they were rubbed with the hand tocurl them. At the time of boiling there was a little _verdigris_ putinto the water (this applied to green tea only. ) After the leaves weredried, they were sifted, to separate the thorns and stalks. After theywere sifted, more verdigris and some Dutch pink were added. Theverdigris gave the leaves that green bloom observable on genuine tea. 

The black tea went through a similar course as the green, except theapplication of Dutch pink: a little verdigris was put in the boiling, and to this was added a small quantity of logwood to dye it, and thusthe manufacture was complete. The drying operation took place on sheetsof iron. Witness knew the defendant, Edward Palmer; he took some of themixture he had been describing, to his shop. The first time he took somewas in May, 1817. In the course of that month, or the beginning of June, he took four or five seven-pound parcels; when he took it there, it wastaken up to the top of the house. Witness afterwards carried some toRussell-street, which was taken to the top of the house, about onehundred weight and three quarters; from this quantity he carriedfifty-three pounds weight to the house of the defendant's porter, by thedesire of Mr. Malins; it was in paper parcels of seven pounds each. 

John Bagster proved that he had been employed by Malins and Proctor, togather sloe and white-thorn leaves: they were taken to Jones's house, and from thence to Malins' coffee-roasting premises; witness receivedtwo-pence per pound for them; he saw the manufacturing going on, but didnot know much about it: witness saw the leaves on sheets of copper, inGoldstone-street. 

This was the case for the Crown. --Verdict for the Crown, 840_l. _

_The Attorney-General against John Prentice. _--This was an informationsimilar to the last, in which the defendant submitted to a verdict forthe Crown. 

_The Attorney-General against Lawson Holmes. _--In this case thedefendant submitted to a verdict for the Crown. 

_The Attorney-General against John Orkney. _--Thomas Jones proved thatthe defendant was a grocer, and in the month of May last he carried tohis shop seven pounds of imitation tea, by the order of John Malins, for which he received the money, viz. 15_s. _ 9_d. _ or 2_s. _ 3_d. _ perpound. 

The jury found a verdict for the Crown. --Penalties 70_l. _

_The Attorney-General against James Gray. _--The defendant submitted to averdict for the Crown. --Penalties 120_l. _

_The Attorney-General against H. Gilbert, and Powel. _--These defendantssubmitted to a verdict. --Penalties 140_l. _

_The Attorney-General against William Clarke. _--This defendant alsosubmitted to a verdict for the Crown. 

_The Attorney-General against George David Bellis. _--This defendantsubmitted to a verdict for the Crown. 

_The Attorney-General against John Horner. _--The defendant in this casewas a grocer; it was proved by Jones that he received twenty pounds ofimitation tea. --Verdict for the Crown. --Penalties 210_l. _

_The Attorney-General against William Dowling. _--This was a grocer. Jones proved that he delivered seven pounds of imitation tea at Mr. Dowling's house, and received the money for it, namely 15_s. _9_d. _--Penalties 70_l. _

METHOD OF DETECTING THE ADULTERATIONS OF TEA. 

The adulteration of tea may be evinced by comparing the botanicalcharacters of the leaves of the two respective trees, and by submittingthem to the action of a few chemical tests. 

The shape of the tea-leaf is slender and narrow, as shewn in thissketch, the edges are deeply serrated, and the end or extremity isacutely pointed. The texture of the leaf is very delicate, its surfacesmooth and glossy, and its colour is a lively pale green. 

[Illustration]

The sloe-leaf (and also the white-thorn leaf, ) as shewn in this sketch, is more rounded, and the leaf is obtusely pointed. The serratures orjags on the edges are not so deep, the surface of the leaf is moreuneven, the texture not so delicate, and the colour is a dark olivegreen. 

[Illustration]

These characters of course can be observed only after the dried leaveshave been suffered to macerate in water for about twenty-four hours. 

The leaves of some sorts of tea may differ in size, but the shape is thesame in all of them; because all the different kinds of tea importedfrom China, are the produce of one species of plant, and the differencebetween the green and souchong, or black tea, depends chiefly upon theclimate, soil, culture, age, and mode of drying the leaves. 

Spurious black tea, [86] slightly moistened, when rubbed on a sheet ofwhite paper, immediately produces a blueish-black stain; and speedilyaffords, when thrown into cold water, a blueish-black tincture, whichinstantly becomes reddened by letting fall into it, a drop or two ofsulphuric acid. 

Two ounces of the suspected leaves, should be infused in half-a-pint ofcold, soft water, and suffered to stand for about an hour. Genuine teaproduces an amber-coloured infusion, which does not become reddened bysulphuric acid. 

All the samples of spurious green tea (nineteen in number) which I haveexamined, were coloured with carbonate of copper (a poisonoussubstance, ) and not by means of verdigris, or copperas. [87] The lattersubstances would instantly turn the tea black; because both thesemetallic salts being soluble in water, are acted on by the astringentmatter of the leaves, whether genuine or spurious, and convert theinfusion into ink. 

Tea, rendered poisonous by carbonate of copper, speedily imparts toliquid ammonia a fine sapphire blue tinge. It is only necessary to shakeup in a stopped vial, for a few minutes, a tea-spoonful of the suspectedleaves, with about two table-spoonsful of liquid ammonia, diluted withhalf its bulk of water. The supernatant liquid will exhibit a fine bluecolour, if the minutest quantity of copper be present. 

Green tea, coloured with carbonate of copper, when thrown into waterimpregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen gas, immediately acquires a blackcolour. Genuine green tea suffers no change from the action of thesetests. 

The presence of copper may be further rendered obvious, by mixing onepart of the suspected tea-leaves, reduced to powder, with two or threeparts of nitrate of potash, (or with two parts of chlorate of potash, )and projecting this mixture by small portions at a time, into a platina, or porcelain-ware crucible, kept red-hot in a coal fire; the wholevegetable matter of the tea leaves will thus become destroyed, and theoxide of copper left behind, in combination with the potash, of thenitrate of potash (or salt-petre, ) or with the muriate of potash, ifchlorate of potash has been employed. 

If water, acidulated with nitric acid, be then poured into the crucibleto dissolve the mass, the presence of the copper may be renderedmanifest by adding to the solution, liquid ammonia, in such quantitythat the pungent odour of it predominates. 

FOOTNOTES:

[85] Also, 2 Geo. I, c. 30, § 5; and 4 Geo. II, c. 14, § 11. 

[86] The examination of twenty-seven samples of imitation tea ofdifferent qualities, from the most costly, to the most common, which itfell to my lot to undertake, induces me to point out the marks ofsophistications here detailed, as the most simple and expeditious. 

[87] Mr. Twining, an eminent tea-merchant, asserts, that "the leaves ofspurious tea are boiled in a copper, with copperas and sheep'sdung. "--See Encyclop. Britan. Vol. Xviii. P. 331. 1797. See also theHistory of the Tea Plant, p. 48; and p. 167 of this Treatise. 

_Counterfeit Coffee. _

The fraud of counterfeiting ground coffee by means of pigeon's beans andpease, is another subject which, not long ago, arrested the attention ofthe public: and from the numerous convictions of grocers prosecuted forthe offence, it is evident that this practice has been carried on for along time, and to a considerable extent. 

The following statement exhibits some of the prosecutions, instituted bythe Solicitor of the Excise, against persons convicted of the fraud ofmanufacturing spurious, and adulterating genuine coffee. 

Alexander Brady, a grocer, (_See p. 182_) prosecuted and convicted ofselling _sham-coffee_, said, "I have sold it for twenty years. " Some ofthe persons prosecuted by the Solicitor of the Excise for this fraud, wemight, at first sight, be inclined to believe, were inconscious that theadulterating of genuine coffee with spurious substances was illegal; butthis ignorance affords no excuse, as the Act of the 43 Geo. III. Cap. 129, explicitly states: "If after the first day of September, 1803, anyburnt, scorched, or roasted pease, beans, or other grain, or vegetablesubstance or substances prepared or manufactured for the purpose ofbeing in imitation of or in any respect to resemble coffee or cocoa, orto serve as a substitute for coffee or cocoa, or alleged or pretended bythe possessor or vender thereof so to be, _shall be made_, or kept forsale, or shall be _offered_ or _exposed to sale_, or shall be _found_ inthe custody or possession of any _dealer_ or dealers in or _seller_ orsellers of _coffee_, or if any burnt, scorched, or roasted pease, beans, or other grain, or vegetable substance or substances not being coffee, shall be called by the preparer, manufacturer, possessor, or venderthereof, by the name of _English_ or _British_ coffee, or _any othername_ of coffee, or by the name of _American_ cocoa, or _English_ or_British_ cocoa, or any other name of cocoa, the same respectively shallbe forfeited, together with the packages containing the same, and shalland may be seized by any officer or officers of Excise; and the personor persons preparing, manufacturing, or selling the same, or having thesame in his, her, or their custody or possession, or the dealer ordealers in or seller or sellers of coffee or cocoa, in whose custodythe same shall be found, shall forfeit and lose the sum of one hundredpounds. "

_The Attorney-General against William Malins. _--This was an informationfiled by the Attorney-General against the defendant, charging him, hebeing a dealer in coffee, with having in his possession a large quantityof imitation coffee, made from scorched pease and beans, resemblingcoffee, and intended to be sold as such, contrary to the statute of the43d of the King, whereby he became liable to pay a fine of 100_l. _

J. Lawes deposed that he had lived servant with the defendant; heconstantly roasted pease and beans, and ground them into powder. When soground, the powder very much resembled coffee. Sometimes the sweepingsof the coffee were thrown in among the pease and beans. Witness carriedout this powder to several grocers in different parts of the town. 

Thomas Jones lived with the defendant. His occupation was roasting andgrinding pease and beans. They looked, when ground, the same as coffee. Witness had seen Mr. John Malins sweep up the refuse coffee, and mix itwith the pease and beans. He had taken out this mixture to grocers. 

J. Richardson, an excise-officer, deposed, that, in December 1817, hewent to the premises of the defendant, and there seized four sacks, fivetubs, and nine pounds in paper, of a powder made to resemble coffee. Thequantity ground was 1, 567 pounds; it had all the appearance of coffee;and a little coffee being mixed with it, any common person might bedeceived. He also seized two sacks, containing 279 pounds of whole peaseand beans roasted. Among the latter were some grains of coffee. Thewitness here produced samples of the articles seized. 

John Lawes deposed, that the articles exhibited were such as he was inthe habit of manufacturing while in Mr. Malins' employment. 

The jury found a verdict for the Crown. --Penalty 100_l. _

_The King against Chaloner. _--Mr. Chaloner, a dealer in tea and coffee, was charged on the oaths of Charles Henry Lord and John Pearson, bothExcise officers, with having in his possession, on the 17th of March, nine pounds of spurious coffee, consisting of burnt pease, beans, andgravel or sand, and a portion of coffee, and with selling some of thesame; also with having in his possession seventeen pounds of vegetablepowder, and an article imitating coffee, which contained not a particleof genuine coffee. 

The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 90_l. _

_The King against Peether. _--This was an information against Mr. ThomasPeether, tea and coffee dealer, charging him with having in hispossession a quantity of imitation coffee (or vegetable powder) on the25th of April last. 

The case being proved by the evidence of several witnesses, thedefendant was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _

_The King against Topping. _--This was an information against Mr. JohnLewis Topping, a dealer in tea and coffee, charging him with havingthirty-seven pounds of vegetable powder in his possession. The articleseized was produced to the commissioners of the Excise. 

The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _

_The King against Samuel Hallett. _--The defendant, Hallett, a grocer anddealer in tea and coffee, was charged with having seven pounds ofimitation coffee in his possession. 

Charles Henry Lord, an officer of the Excise, being sworn, stated, thathe and Spencer, an officer, went, on the 28th of February last, to theshop of the defendant, and asked for an ounce of coffee, at threehalfpence per ounce. He received the same, and having paid for it, leftthe shop. He examined the article, and found it was part coffee, andpart imitation coffee, or what the defendant called vegetable powder, which is nothing more nor less than burnt pease and beans ground in amill. 

Spencer, the officer of the Excise, corroborated the above evidence, andstated, that the sham-coffee seized at the defendant's house was shownto Mr. Joseph Hubbard, grocer, and tea and coffee dealer, inHigh-street, in the Borough of Southwark. 

Mr. Hubbard being sworn, stated, that he had examined the sham-coffeeseized by the officers in the defendant's shop. The one ounce purchasedby Lord, he knew to be nothing else than black pigeon's beans; there wasno coffee amongst it. 

The defendant was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _

_The King against Fox. _--Mr. Edward Fox, grocer, and dealer in tea andcoffee, was charged with having a large quantity of sham-coffee in hispossession, and with selling the same for genuine coffee. 

Henry Spencer, an officer of the Excise, stated, that on the 21st ofFebruary he and Lord, another officer, went to the defendant's shop andpurchased an ounce of coffee, for which he paid three halfpence. Theyexamined it, and he was satisfied it was not genuine coffee; theypurchased another ounce (which he produced to the commissioners of theExcise, who examined it); they were convinced it consisted partly ofcoffee and beans and pease. 

The defendant, in his defence said, that the poor people wanted alow-price article; and by mixing the vegetable powder and coffeetogether, he was able to sell it at three halfpence an ounce; he hadsold it for years; he did it as a matter of accommodation to the poor, who could not give a higher price; he did not sell it for genuinecoffee. 

_Commissioner. _--"Then you have been defrauding the public for manyyears, and injuring the revenue by your illicit practices: the poor havean equal right to be supplied with as genuine an article as the rich. "

He was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _

_The King against Brady. _--The defendant, Mr. Alexander Brady, grocer, and dealer in tea and coffee, was charged with having, on the 28th ofFebruary last, in his possession eighteen pounds of sham-coffee, andselling the same for genuine coffee. 

Lord and Pearson, Excise officers, stated, that they purchased an ounceof coffee of the defendant, on the 28th of February, and upon examiningit they discovered that it was made up of pease and beans, ground with asmall quantity of coffee. They also found eighteen pounds of vegetablepowder mixed with coffee, in a state prepared for sale, wrapped inpapers. 

One of the commissioners tasted some of the eighteen pounds ofsham-coffee produced by the officers, and declared that it was a mostinfamous stuff, and unfit for human food. 

_Defendant. _--"Why, I have sold it for twenty years. "

_Commissioner. _--"Then you have been for twenty years acting mostdishonestly, defrauding the revenue; and the health of the poor musthave suffered very much by taking such an unwholesome article. Yourhaving dealt in this article so long aggravates your case; you have fortwenty years been selling burnt beans and pease for genuine coffee. --Youare convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _"

_The King against Bowser. _--The excise officers stated, that on the 28thof February they went to his shop: he was a grocer, dealer in tea andcoffee; they seized seven pounds and a half of vegetable powder, whichcontained very little coffee, if any; and also a quarter of a pound ofcoffee mixed with vegetable powder. 

The defendant pleaded guilty to the charge, and prayed the court tomitigate the penalty. He was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _

_The King against Thomas Owen. _--The defendant, an extensive dealer intea and coffee, appeared to an information charging him with having inhis possession, and selling, a quantity of deleterious ingredients, andmixing them with coffee. 

Charles Henry Lord deposed, that on the 26th of February, he found, atthe shop of the defendant, nineteen pounds of a composition consistingof beans and pease ground, and prepared so as to imitate coffee. He alsodiscovered two pounds and a half of a mixture of coffee and vegetablepowder. On the same day he proceeded to another shop of the defendant, and he there found five pounds more of the same stuff. 

Samples of the composition, in its mixed and unmixed state, wereproduced. 

Mr. Lawes addressed the commissioners on behalf of the defendant, inmitigation of punishment; for he did not mean to deny the offence. Hisclient was a very young man, and had been most unfortunate in business. He was not aware until lately of the existence of any law by which itcould be punished. 

The Commissioners observed, that they had a double duty to perform, namely, to protect the revenue from fraud, and to prevent the publicfrom being imposed upon and injured by ingredients served to theminstead of the food they intended to purchase. The fraud upon therevenue was, in the estimation of the court, the least part of theoffence. Under all the circumstances, however, the court was inclined tobe lenient to the defendant. 

He was convicted in the penalty of 50_l. _ for each quantity ofsham-coffee. 

Mr. Greely and Mr. William Dando were fined 20_l. _ each; and Mr. Hirlingand Mr. Terry were fined 90_l. _ each for selling spurious coffee. 

The adulteration of ground coffee, with pease and beans, is beyond thereach of chemical analysis; but it may, perhaps, not be amiss on thisoccasion to give to our readers a piece of advice given by a retiredgrocer to a friend, at no distant period:--"Never, my good fellow, " hesaid, "purchase from a grocer any thing which passes through his mill. You know not what you get instead of the article you expect toreceive--coffee, pepper, and all-spice, are all mixed with substanceswhich detract from their own natural qualities. "--Persons keeping millsof their own can at all times prevent these impositions. 

_Adulteration of Brandy, Rum, and Gin. _

By the Excise laws at present existing in this country, the variousdegrees of strength of brandy, rum, arrack, gin, whiskey, and otherspiritous liquors, chiefly composed of little else than spirit of wine, are determined by the quantity of alcohol of a given specific gravitycontained in the spiritous liquors of a supposed unknown strength. Thegreat public importance of this subject in this country, where theconsumption of spiritous liquors adds a vast sum to the public revenue, has been the means of instituting many very interesting series ofexperiments on this subject. The instrument used for that purpose by theCustoms and officers of Excise, is called _Sikes_'s hydrometer, [88]which has now superseded the instrument called _Clark_'s hydrometer, heretofore in use. 

The specific gravity or strength of the legal standard spirit of theExcise, is technically called _proof_ or _proof spirit_. "This liquor(not being spirit sweetened, or having any ingredient dissolved in it, to defeat the strength thereof, ) at the temperature of 57° Faht. Weighsexactly 12/13th parts of an equal measure of distilled water;" and withthis spirit the strength of all other spiritous liquors are comparedaccording to law. 

The strength of spirit stronger than _proof_ or _over proof_, as it istermed by the revenue officers, is indicated by the bulk of waternecessary to reduce a given volume of it, to the legal standard spirit, denominated _proof_--namely; if one gallon of water be required to bringtwenty gallons of brandy, rum, or any other spirit, to proof, thatspirit is said to be _1 to 20 over proof_. If one gallon of water berequired to bring 15, 10, 5, or 2 gallons of the liquor to _proof_, itis said to be 1 to 15, 1 to 10, 1 to 5, and 1 to 2, _over proof_. 

The strength of brandy, rum, arrack, gin, or other spiritous liquors, weaker than _proof_, or under _proof_, is estimated by the quantity ofwater which would be necessary to abstract or bring the spirit up toproof. 

Thus, if from twenty gallons of brandy one gallon of water must beabstracted to bring it to proof, it is said to be 1 in 20 under proof. If from 15, 10, 5, or 2 gallons of the liquor, 1 gallon of water must beabstracted to bring it to proof, it is said to be 1 in 15, 1 in 10, 1 in5, and 1 in 2 under proof. 

It is necessary to understand this absurd language, which is in useamongst the officers of Excise and dealers in spirit, in order to knowwhat is meant in commerce by the strength of spiritous liquors ofdifferent denominations. And hence, for the business of the exciseman, atable has been constructed, expressing the strength or specific gravityof mixtures of different proportions of spirit and water, at differentdegrees of temperature; and according to this table the duty on spiritis now levied. 

Brandy and rum is seizable, if sold by, or found in the possession of, the dealer, unless it possesses a certain strength. [89] The followingare the words of the Act:

"No distiller, rectifier, [90] compounder or dealer, shall serve or sendout any foreign spirits, of a lower strength than that of 1 in 6 underhydrometer proof, [91] nor have in his possession any foreign spiritsmixed together, except shrub, cherry or raspberry brandy, of lowerstrength than as aforesaid, upon pain of such spirits being forfeited;and such spirits, with the casks and vessels containing the same, may beseized by any officer of Excise. "

We have, therefore, a ready check against the frauds of the dishonestdealers, in spiritous liquors. If the spirit merchant engages to delivera liquor of a certain strength, the hydrometer is by far the most easyand expeditious check that can be adopted to guard against frauds ofreceiving a weaker liquor for a stronger one; and to those individualswho are in the habit of purchasing large quantities of brandy, rum, orother spiritous liquors, the hydrometer renders the greatest service. For it is by no means an uncommon occurrence to meet with brandy, rum, and other spiritous liquors, of a specific gravity very much below thepretended strength which the liquor ought to possess. 

The following advice, given to his readers, [92] by the author of aTreatise on Brewing and Distilling, may serve to put the unwary on theirguard against some of the frauds practised by mercenary dealers. 

"It is a custom among retailing distillers, which I have not takennotice of in this directory, to put one-third or one-fourth part ofproof molasses brandy, proportionably, to what rum they dispose of;which cannot be distinguished, but by an extraordinary palate, and doesnot at all lessen the body or proof of the goods; but makes them abouttwo shillings a gallon cheaper; and must be well mixed and incorporatedtogether in your retailing cask; but you should keep some of the bestrum, not adulterated, to please some customers, whose judgment andpalate must be humoured. "

"When you are to draw a sample of goods to shew a person that hasjudgment in the proof, do not draw your goods into a phial to be tasted, or make experiment of the strength thereof that way, because the proofwill not hold except the goods be exceedingly strong; but draw thepattern of goods rather into a glass from the cock, to run very small, or rather draw off a small quantity into a little pewter pot and pour itinto your glass, extending your pot as high above the glasses as you canwithout wasting it, which makes the goods carry a better headabundantly, than if the same goods were to be put and tried in a phial. "

"You must be so prudent as to make a distinction of the persons you haveto deal with; what goods you sell to gentlemen for their own use, whorequire a great deal of attendance, and as much for time of payment, youmust take a considerably greater price than of others; what goods yousell to persons where you believe there is a manifest, or at least somehazard of your money, you may safely sell for more than common profit;what goods you sell to the poor, especially medicinally, (as many ofyour goods are sanative, ) be as compassionate as the cases require. "

"All brandies, whether French, Spanish, or English; being proof goods, will admit of one point of _liquor_[93] to each gallon, to be made upand incorporated therewith in your cask, for retail, or selling smallerquantities; and all persons that insist upon having proof goods, whichnot one in twenty understands, you must supply out of what goods are notso reduced, though at a higher price. "

Such is the advice given by Mr. Shannon. 

The mode of judging by the taste of spiritous liquors is deceitful. Afalse strength is given to a weak liquor, by infusing in it acridvegetable substances, or by adding to it a tincture of grains ofparadise and Guinea pepper. These substances impart to weak brandy orrum, an extremely hot and pungent taste. 

Brandy and rum is also frequently sophisticated with British molasses, or sugar-spirit, coloured with burnt sugar. 

The flavour which characterises French brandy, and which is owing to asmall portion of a peculiar essential oil contained in it, is imitatedby distilling British molasses-spirit over wine lees;[94] but thespirit, prior to being distilled over wine lees, is previouslydeprived, in part, of its peculiar disagreeable flavour, byrectification over fresh burnt charcoal and quick-lime. Otherbrandy-merchants employ a spirit obtained from raisin wine, which issuffered to pass into an incipient ascescency. The spirit thus procuredpartakes strongly of the flavour which is characteristic to foreignbrandy. 

Oak saw-dust, and a spiritous tincture of raisin stones, are likewiseused to impart to new brandy and rum a _ripe taste_, resembling brandyor rum long kept in oaken casks, and a somewhat oily consistence, so asto form a durable froth at its surface, when strongly agitated in avial. The colouring substances are burnt sugar, or molasses; the lattergives to imitative brandy a luscious taste, and fulness _in the mouth_. These properties are said to render it particularly fit for the retailLondon customers. 

The following is the method of compounding or _making up_, as it istechnically called, _brandy_[95] for retail:

 Gallons "To ten puncheons of brandy 1081 Add flavoured raisin spirit 118 Tincture of grains of paradise 4 Cherry laurel water 2 Spirit of almond cakes 2 ------- 1207

"Add also 10 handfuls of oak saw-dust; and give it _complexion_ withburnt sugar. "

METHOD OF DETECTING THE ADULTERATIONS OF BRANDY, RUM, AND MALT SPIRIT. 

The false strength of brandy or rum is rendered obvious by diluting thesuspected liquor with water; the acrimony of the capsicum, and grains ofparadise, or pepper, may then be readily discovered by the taste. 

The adulteration of brandy with British molasses, or sugar-spirit, becomes evident by rubbing a portion of the suspected brandy betweenthe palms of the hands; the spirit, as it evaporates, leaves thedisagreeable flavour which is peculiar to all British spirits. Or theliquor may be deprived of its alcohol, by heating a portion in a spoonover a candle, till the vapour ceases to catch fire on the approach of alighted taper. The residue thus obtained, of genuine French brandy, possesses a vinous odour, still resembling the original flavour of thebrandy, whilst the residue, produced from sophisticated brandy, has apeculiarly disagreeable smell, resembling gin, or the breath of habitualdrunkards. 

Arrack is coarsely imitated by adding to rum a small quantity ofpyroligneous acid and some flowers (acid) of benzoe. The compound thusproduced, however, must be pronounced a bad one. The author of a verypopular Cookery Book, [96] directs two scruples of benzoic acid to bedissolved in one quart of rum, to make "_mock arrack_. "

MALT SPIRIT. 

Malt spirit, or gin, the favourite liquor of the lower order of people, which is characterised by the peculiar flavour of juniper berries, overwhich the raw spirit is distilled, is usually obtained from a mixture ofmalt and barley: sometimes both molasses and corn are employed, particularly if there be a scarcity of grain. But the flavour ofwhiskey, which is made from barley and oats, is owing to the maltedgrain being dried with peat, the smoke of which gives it thecharacteristic taste. 

The malt distiller is not allowed to furnish, under a heavy penalty, anycrude or raw spirit to the rectifier or manufacturer of gin, of agreater strength than seven per cent. Over proof. The rectifier whoreceives the spirit from the malt distiller is not allowed, under acertain penalty, to sweeten the liquor with sugar or other substances;nor is he permitted to send out the spirit to his customers but of acertain strength, as is obvious from the following words of the Act:

"No rectifier or compounder shall sell or send out any British brandy, British rectified spirits, British compounds, or other British spirits, of greater strength than that of one in five under hydrometer proof[97]:and if he shall sell and send out any such spirits of a greater strengththan that of one in five under hydrometer proof, such spirits, with thecasks or vessels containing the same, shall be forfeited, and may beseized by any officer of Excise; and he shall also forfeit treble thevalue of such spirit, or 50_l. _ at the election of the King'sattorney-general, or the person who shall sue for the same; the singlevalue of such spirits to be estimated at the highest London Price. [98]"

If we examine gin, as retailed, we shall soon be convinced that it is acustom, pretty prevalent amongst dealers, to weaken this liquorconsiderably with water, and to sweeten it with sugar. This fraud mayreadily be detected by evaporating a quantity of the liquor in atable-spoon over a candle, to dryness; the sugar will thus be renderedobvious, in the form of a gum-like substance, when the spirit isvolatilised. 

One hundred and twenty gallons of genuine gin, as obtained from thewholesale manufactories, are usually _made up_ by fraudulent retailers, into a saleable commodity, with fourteen gallons of water and twenty-sixpounds of sugar. Now this dilution of the liquor produces a turbidness;because the oil of juniper and other flavouring substances which thespirit holds in solution, become precipitated by virtue of the water, and thus cause the liquor to assume an opaline colour: and the spiritthus weakened, cannot readily be rendered clear again by subsidence. Several expedients are had recourse to, to clarify the liquor in anexpeditious manner; some of which are harmless; others are criminal, because they render the liquor poisonous. 

One of the methods, which is innocent, consists in adding to theweakened liquor, first, a portion of alum dissolved in water, and then asolution of sub-carbonate of potash. The whole is stirred together, andleft undisturbed for twenty-four hours. The precipitated alumine thusproduced from the alum, by virtue of the sub-carbonate of potash, actsas a strainer upon the milky liquor, and carries down with it the finelydivided oily matter which produced the blue colour of the dilutedliquor. Roach, or Roman alum, is also employed, without any otheraddition, for clarifying spiritous liquors. 

"_To reduce unsweetened Gin. _[99]

 "A tun of fine gin 252 gallons "Water 36 ----- "Which added together make 288 gallons

 "The _doctor is now put_ on, and it is further reduced with water 19 ----- "Which gives Total 307 gallons of gin. 

"This done, let 1 lb. Of alum be just covered with water, and dissolvedby boiling; rummage the whole well together, and pour in the alum, andthe whole will be fine in a few hours. "

"_To prepare and sweeten British Gin. _[100]

"Get from your distiller an empty puncheon or cask, which will containabout 133 gallons. Then take a cask of clear rectified spirits, 120gallons, of the usual strength as rectifiers sell their goods at, putthe 120 gallons of spirits into your empty cask. 

"Then take a quarter of an ounce of oil of vitriol, half an ounce ofoil of almonds, a quarter of an ounce of oil of turpentine, one ounce ofoil of juniper berries, half a pint of spirit of wine, and half a poundof lump sugar. Beat or rub the above in a mortar. When well rubbedtogether, have ready prepared half a gallon of lime water, one gallon ofrose water; mix the whole in either a pail, or cask, with a stick, tillevery particle shall be dissolved; then add to the foregoing, twenty-five pounds of sugar dissolved in about nine gallons of rain orThames water, or water that has been boiled, mix the whole welltogether, and stir them carefully with a stick in the 133 gallons cask. 

"To _force down_ the same, take and boil eight ounces of alum in threequarts of water, for three quarters of an hour; take it from the fire, and dissolve by degrees six or seven ounces of salt of tartar. When thesame is milk-warm pour it into your gin, and stir it well together, asbefore, for five minutes, the same as you would a butt of beer newlyfined. Let your cask stand as you mean to draw it. At every time youpurpose to sweeten again, that cask must be well washed out; and takegreat care never to shake your cask all the while it is drawing. "

Another method of fining spiritous liquors, consists in adding to it, first, a solution of sub-acetate of lead, and then a solution of alum. This practice is highly dangerous, because part of the sulphate of leadproduced, remains dissolved in the liquor, which it thus renderspoisonous. Unfortunately, this method of clarifying spiritous liquors, Ihave good reason to believe, is more frequently practised than thepreceding method, because its action is more rapid; and it imparts tothe liquor a fine _complexion_, or great refractive power; hence somevestiges of lead may often be detected in malt spirit. 

The weakened spirit is then sweetened with sugar, and, to cover the rawtaste of the malt spirit, _false strength_ is given to it with grains ofparadise, Guinea pepper, capsicum, and other acrid and aromaticsubstances. 

METHOD OF DETECTING THE PRESENCE OF LEAD IN SPIRITOUS LIQUORS. 

The presence of lead may be detected in spiritous liquors, as stated onpages 70 and 86. The cordial called shrub frequently exhibits vestigesof copper. This contamination, I have been informed, is accidental, andoriginates from the metallic vessels employed in the manufacture of theliquor. 

METHOD OF ASCERTAINING THE QUANTITY OF ALCOHOL IN DIFFERENT KINDS OFSPIRITOUS LIQUORS. 

The quantity of real alcohol in any spiritous liquors may readily beascertained by simple distillation, which process separates the alcoholfrom the water and foreign matters contained in the liquor. Put anyquantity of brandy, rum, or malt spirit diluted with about one-fourthits bulk of water, into a retort fitted to a capacious receiver, anddistil with a gentle heat. The strongest spirit distils over first intothe receiver, and the strength of the obtained products decreases, tillat last it contains so much water as no longer to be inflammable by theapproach of a lighted taper, when held in a spoon over a candle (see p. 160. ) If the process be continued, the distilled product becomes milky, scarcely spiritous to the smell, and of an acidulous taste. Thedistilling operation may then be discontinued. If the first, fourth orthird part of the distilled product has been set apart, it will befound a moderately strong alcohol, and the remainder one more diluted. If the whole distilled spirit be mixed with perfectly dry subcarbonateof potash, the alcohol will float at the top of the potash, as stated, p. 161; it will separate into two distinct fluids. If the decantedalcohol be redistilled carefully with a very gentle heat, over a smallportion of dry quick lime, or muriate of lime, it will be obtainedextremely pure, and of a specific gravity of about 825, at 60° oftemperature. Its flavour will vary according to the kind of spiritousliquor from which it is obtained. 

_Table exhibiting the Per Centage of Alcohol (of 825 specific gravity)contained in various kinds of spiritous Liquors. _[101]

 Proportion of Alcohol per Cent. By Measure. 

Brandy, Cogniac, average proportion of 4 samples 52, 75Ditto, Bourdeaux, ditto ditto 54, 50Ditto, Cette 53, 00Ditto, Naples, average of 3 samples 53, 25Ditto, Spanish average of 6 samples 52, 28Rum 53, 68Ditto, Leeward, average of 9 samples 53, 00Scotch Whiskey, average of 6 samples 53, 50Irish Ditto, average of 4 samples 54, 25Arrack, Batavia 49, 50Dutch Geneva 52, 25Gin (Hodges's, [102]) 3 samples, procured from retail dealers 48, 25Ditto (Ditto, )[102] procured from the manufacturer 52, 35

FOOTNOTES:

[88] George III. C. Xxviii. May 1818--"An Act for establishing the useof Sikes's hydrometer in ascertaining the strength of spirit, instead ofClark's hydrometer. "

[89] Sixteen and a half per cent. Proof, according to Sikes'shydrometer. 

[90] 30 Geo. III c. 37, § 31. 

[91] According to Clarke's hydrometer. 

[92] Observations on Malted and Unmalted Corn, connected with Brewingand Distilling, p. 167; and Shannon on Brewing and Distilling, p. 232, 233. 

[93] Water. 

[94] This operation forms part of the business of the so-called brewers'druggists. It forms the article in their Price Currents, called _SpiritFlavour_. 

Wine lees are imported in this country for that purpose: they pay thesame duty as foreign wines. 

[95] Observations on Malted and Unmalted Corn, connected with Brewingand Distilling, p. 167. 

[96] Apicius Redivivus, 2d edition, p. 480. 

[97] Clark's hydrometer. 

[98] 30 Geo. III. C. 37, § 6. 

[99] Shannon on Brewing and Distilling, p. 198. 

[100] Ibid. P. 199. 

[101] Repository of Arts, p. 350, Dec. 1819. 

[102] Own experiment. 

_Poisonous Cheese. _

Several instances have come under my notice in which Gloucester cheesehas been contaminated with red lead, and has produced seriousconsequences on being taken into the stomach. In one poisonous samplewhich it fell to my lot to investigate, the evil had been caused by thesophistication of the anotta, employed for colouring cheese. Thissubstance was found to contain a portion of red lead; a method ofsophistication which has lately been confirmed by the following fact, communicated to the public by Mr. J. W. Wright, of Cambridge. [103]

"As a striking example of the extent to which adulterated articles offood may be unconsciously diffused, and of the consequent difficulty ofdetecting the real fabricators of them, it may not be uninteresting torelate to your readers, the various steps by which the fraud of apoisonous adulteration of cheese was traced to its source. 

"Your readers ought here to be told, that several instances are onrecord, that Gloucester and other cheeses have been found contaminatedwith red lead, and that this contamination has produced seriousconsequences. In the instance now alluded to, and probably in all othercases, the deleterious mixture had been caused ignorantly, by theadulteration of the anotta employed for colouring the cheese. Thissubstance, in the instance I shall relate, was found to contain aportion of red lead; a species of adulteration which subsequentexperiments have shewn to be by no means uncommon. Before I proceedfurther to trace this fraud to its source, I shall briefly relate thecircumstance which gave rise to its detection. 

"A gentleman, who had occasion to reside for some time in a city in theWest of England, was one night seized with a distressing butindescribable pain in the region of the abdomen and of the stomach, accompanied with a feeling of tension, which occasioned muchrestlessness, anxiety, and repugnance to food. He began to apprehend theaccess of an inflammatory disorder; but in twenty-four hours thesymptoms entirely subsided. In four days afterwards he experienced anattack precisely similar; and he then recollected, that having, on bothoccasions, arrived from the country late in the evening, he had ordereda plate of toasted Gloucester cheese, of which he had partaken heartily;a dish which, when at home, regularly served him for supper. Heattributed his illness to the cheese. The circumstance was mentioned tothe mistress of the inn, who expressed great surprise, as the cheese inquestion was not purchased from a country dealer, but from a highlyrespectable shop in London. He, therefore, ascribed the before-mentionedeffects to some peculiarity in his constitution. A few days afterwardshe partook of the same cheese; and he had scarcely retired to rest, whena most violent cholic seized him, which lasted the whole night and partof the ensuing day. The cook was now directed henceforth not to serve upany toasted cheese, and he never again experienced these distressingsymptoms. Whilst this matter was a subject of conversation in the house, a servant-maid mentioned that a kitten had been violently sick afterhaving eaten the rind cut off from the cheese prepared for thegentleman's supper. The landlady, in consequence of this statement, ordered the cheese to be examined by a chemist in the vicinity, whoreturned for answer, that the cheese was contaminated with lead! Sounexpected an answer arrested general attention, and more particularlyas the suspected cheese had been served up for several other customers. 

"Application was therefore made by the London dealer to the farmer whomanufactured the cheese: he declared that he had bought the anotta of amercantile traveller, who had supplied him and his neighbours for yearswith that commodity, without giving occasion to a single complaint. Onsubsequent inquiries, through a circuitous channel, unnecessary to bedetailed here at length, on the part of the manufacturer of the cheese, it was found, that as the supplies of anotta had been defective and ofinferior quality, recourse had been had to the expedient of colouringthe commodity with vermilion. Even this admixture could not beconsidered deleterious. But on further application being made to thedruggist who sold the article, the answer was, that the vermilion hadbeen mixed with a portion of red lead; and the deception was held to beperfectly innocent, as frequently practised on the supposition, thatthe vermilion would be used only as a pigment for house-painting. Thusthe druggist sold his vermilion in the regular way of trade, adulteratedwith red lead to increase his profit, without any suspicion of the useto which it would be applied; and the purchaser who adulterated theanotta, presuming that the vermilion was genuine, had no hesitation inheightening the colour of his spurious anotta with so harmless anadjunct. Thus, through the circuitous and diversified operations ofcommerce, a portion of deadly poison may find admission into thenecessaries of life, in a way which can attach no criminality to theparties through whose hands it has successively passed. "

This dangerous sophistication may be detected by macerating a portion ofthe suspected cheese in water impregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen, acidulated with muriatic acid; which will instantly cause the cheese toassume a brown or black colour, if the minutest portion of lead bepresent. 

FOOTNOTES:

[103] Repository of Arts, vol. Viii. No. 47, p. 262. 

_Counterfeit Pepper. _

Black pepper is the fruit of a shrubby creeping plant, which grows wildin the East Indies, and is cultivated, with much advantage, for the sakeof its berries, in Java and Malabar. The berries are gathered beforethey are ripe, and are dried in the sun. They become black andcorrugated on the surface. 

This factitious pepper-corns have of late been detected mixed withgenuine pepper, is a fact sufficiently known. [104] Such an adulterationmay prove, in many instances of household economy, exceedingly vexatiousand prejudicial to those who ignorantly make use of the spuriousarticle. I have examined large packages of both black and white pepper, by order of the Excise, and have found them to contain about 16 percent. Of this artificial compound. The spurious pepper is made up ofoil cakes (the residue of lintseed, from which the oil has beenpressed, ) common clay, and a portion of Cayenne pepper, formed in amass, and granulated by being first pressed through a sieve, and thenrolled in a cask. The mode of detecting the fraud is easy. It is onlynecessary to throw a sample of the suspected pepper into a bowl ofwater; the artificial pepper-corns fall to powder, whilst the truepepper remains whole. 

Ground pepper is very often sophisticated by adding to a portion ofgenuine pepper, a quantity of pepper dust, or the sweepings from thepepper warehouses, mixed with a little Cayenne pepper. The sweepings areknown, and purchased in the market, under the name of P. D. Signifyingpepper dust. An inferior sort of this vile refuse, or the sweepings ofP. D. Is distinguished among venders by the abbreviation of D. P. D. Denoting, dust (dirt) of pepper dust. 

The adulteration of pepper, and the making and selling commodities inimitation of pepper, are prohibited, under a severe penalty. Thefollowing are the words of the Act:[105]

"And whereas commodities made in imitation of pepper have of late beensold and found in the possession of various dealers in pepper, and otherpersons in Great Britain; be it therefore enacted, that from and afterthe said 5th day of July, 1819, if any commodity or substance shall beprepared by any person in imitation of pepper, shall be mixed withpepper, or sold or delivered as and for, or as a substitute for, pepper, or if any such commodity or substance, alone or mixed, shall be kept forsale, sold, or delivered, or shall be offered or exposed to sale, orshall be in the custody or possession of any dealer or seller of pepper, the same, together with all pepper with which the same shall be mixed, shall be forfeited, with the packages containing the same, and shall andmay be seized by any officer of excise; and the person preparing, manufacturing, mixing as aforesaid, selling, exposing to sale, ordelivering the same, or having the same in his, her, or their custody orpossession, shall forfeit the sum of one hundred pounds. "

WHITE PEPPER. 

The common white pepper is factitious, being prepared from the blackpepper in the following manner:--The pepper is first steeped in seawater and urine, and then exposed to the heat of the sun for severaldays, till the rind or outer bark loosens; it is then taken out of thesteep, and, when dry, it is rubbed with the hand till the rind fallsoff. The white fruit is then dried, and the remains of the rind blownaway like chaff. A great deal of the peculiar flavour and pungent hottaste of the pepper is taken off by this process. White pepper is alwaysinferior in flavour and quality to the black pepper. 

However, there is a sort of native white pepper, produced on a speciesof the pepper plant, which is much better than the factitious, andindeed little inferior to the common black pepper. 

FOOTNOTES:

[104] Thomson's Annals of Chemistry, 1816; also Repository of Arts, vol. I. 1816, p. 11. 

[105] George III. C. 53, § 21, 1819. 

_Poisonous Cayenne Pepper. _

Cayenne pepper is an indiscriminate mixture of the powder of the driedpods of many species of capsicum, but especially of the capsicumfrutescens, or bird pepper, which is the hottest of all. 

This annual plant, a native of South America, is cultivated in largequantities in our West-India islands, and even frequently in ourgardens, for the beauty of its pods, which are long, pointed, andpendulous, at first of a green colour, and, when ripe, of a brightorange red. They are filled with a dry loose pulp, and contain manysmall, flat, kidney-shaped seeds. The taste of capsicum is extremelypungent and acrimonious, setting the mouth, as it were, on fire. 

The principle on which its pungency depends, is soluble in water and inalcohol. 

It is sometimes adulterated with red lead, to prevent it becomingbleached on exposure to light. This fraud may be readily detected byshaking up part of it in a stopped vial containing water impregnatedwith sulphuretted hydrogen gas, which will cause it speedily to assume adark muddy black colour. Or the vegetable matter of the pepper may bedestroyed, by throwing a mixture of one part of the suspected pepper andthree of nitrate of potash (or two of chlorate of potash) into a red-hotcrucible, in small quantities at a time. The mass left behind may thenbe digested in weak nitric acid, and the solution assayed for lead bywater impregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen. 

_Poisonous Pickles. _

Vegetable substances, preserved in the state called pickles, by means ofthe antiseptic power of vinegar, whose sale frequently depends greatlyupon a fine lively green colour; and the consumption of which, bysea-faring people in particular, is prodigious, are sometimesintentionally coloured by means of copper. Gerkins, French beans, samphires, the green pods of capsicum, and many other pickled vegetablesubstances, oftener than is perhaps expected, are met with impregnatedwith this metal. Numerous fatal consequences are known to have ensuedfrom the use of these stimulants of the palate, to which the fresh andpleasing hue has been imparted according to the deadly _formulæ_ laiddown in some modern cookery books, such as boiling the pickles withhalf-pence, or suffering them to stand for a considerable period inbrazen vessels. 

Dr. Percival[106] has given an account of "a young lady who amusedherself, while her hair was dressing, with eating samphire picklesimpregnated with copper. She soon complained of pain in the stomach;and, in five days, vomiting commenced, which was incessant for two days. After this, her stomach became prodigiously distended; and, in nine daysafter eating the pickles, death relieved her from her suffering. "

Among many recipes which modern authors of cookery books have given forimparting a green colour to pickles, the following are particularlydeserving of censure; and it is to be hoped that they will be suppressedin future editions of the works. 

"_To Pickle Gerkins. _[107]--"Boil the vinegar in a bell-metal or copperpot; pour it boiling hot on your cucumbers. "

"_To make greening. _[108]--"Take a bit of verdigris, the bigness of ahazel-nut, finely powdered; half-a-pint of distilled vinegar, and a bitof alum powder, with a little bay salt. Put all in a bottle, shake it, and let it stand till clear. Put a small tea-spoonful into codlings, orwhatever you wish to green. "

Mrs. E. Raffald[109] directs, "to render pickles green, boil them withhalfpence, or allow them to stand for twenty-four hours in copper orbrass pans. "

To detect the presence of copper, it is only necessary to mince thepickles, and to pour liquid ammonia, diluted with an equal bulk ofwater, over them in a stopped phial: if the pickles contain the minutestquantity of copper, the ammonia assumes a blue colour. 

FOOTNOTES:

[106] Medical Transactions, vol. Iv. P. 80. 

[107] The Ladies' Library, vol. Ii. P. 203. 

[108] Modern Cookery, or the English Housewife--2d edition, p. 94. 

[109] The English Housekeeper, p. 352, 354. 

_Adulteration of Vinegar. _

Vinegar, as prepared in this country, from malt, should be of a palebrown colour, perfectly transparent, of a pleasant, somewhat pungent, acid taste, and fragrant odour, but without any acrimony. From themucilaginous impurities which malt vinegar always contains, it is apt, on exposure to air, to become turbid and ropy, and at last vapid. Theinconvenience is best obviated by keeping the vinegar in bottlescompletely filled and well corked; and it is of advantage to boil it inthe bottles a few minutes before they are corked. 

Vinegar is sometimes largely adulterated with sulphuric acid, to give itmore acidity. The presence of this acid is detected, if, on the additionof a solution of acetate of barytes, a white precipitate is formed, which is insoluble in nitric acid, after having been made red-hot in thefire. (See p. 159. ) With the same intention, of making the vinegarappear stronger, different acrid vegetable substances are infused in it. This fraud is difficult of detection; but when tasted with attention, the pungency of such vinegar will be found to depend rather on acrimonythan acidity. 

Distilled vinegar, which is employed for various purposes of domesticeconomy, is frequently distilled, not in glass, as it ought to be, butin common stills with a pewter pipe, whence it cannot fail to acquire ametallic impregnation. 

One ounce, by measure, should dissolve at least thirteen grains of whitemarble. 

It should not form a precipitate on the addition of a solution ofacetate of barytes, or of water saturated with sulphuretted hydrogen. The former circumstance shews, that it is adulterated with sulphuricacid; and the latter indicates a metal. 

The metallic impregnation is best rendered obvious by sulphurettedhydrogen, in the manner stated, page 69. The distilled vinegar ofcommerce usually contains tin, and not lead, as has been asserted. 

_Adulteration of Cream. _

Cream is often adulterated with rice powder or arrow root. The former isfrequently employed for that purpose by pastry cooks, in fabricatingcreams and custards, for tarts, and other kinds of pastry. The latter isoften used in the London dairies. Arrow-root is preferable to ricepowder; for, when converted with milk into a thick mucilage by a gentleebullition, it imparts to cream, previously diluted with milk, aconsistence and apparent richness, by no means unpalatable, withoutmaterially impairing the taste of the cream. 

The arrow-root powder is mixed up with a small quantity of cold skimmedmilk into a perfect, smooth, uniform mixture; more milk is then added, and the whole boiled for a few minutes, to effect the solution of thearrow-root: this compound, when perfectly cold, is mixed up with thecream. From 220 to 260 grains, (or three large tea-spoonfuls) ofarrow root are added to one pint of milk; and one part of this solutionis mixed with three of cream. It is scarcely necessary to state thatthis sophistication is innocuous. 

The fraud may be detected by adding to a tea-spoonful of thesophisticated cream a few drops of a solution of iodine in spirit ofwine, which instantly produces with it a dark blue colour. Genuine creamacquires, by the addition of this test, a faint yellow tinge. 

_Poisonous Confectionery. _

In the preparation of sugar plums, comfits, and other kinds ofconfectionery, especially those sweetmeats of inferior quality, frequently exposed to sale in the open streets, for the allurement ofchildren, the grossest abuses are committed. The white comfits, calledsugar pease, are chiefly composed of a mixture of sugar, starch, andCornish clay (a species of very white pipe-clay;) and the red sugardrops are usually coloured with the inferior kind of vermilion. Thepigment is generally adulterated with red lead. Other kinds ofsweetmeats are sometimes rendered poisonous by being coloured withpreparations of copper. The following account of Mr. Miles[110] may beadvanced in proof of this statement. 

"Some time ago, while residing in the house of a confectioner, Inoticed the colouring of the green fancy sweetmeats being done bydissolving sap-green in brandy. Now sap-green itself, as prepared fromthe juice of the buckthorn berries, is no doubt a harmless substance;but the manufacturers of this colour have for many years past producedvarious tints, some extremely bright, which there can be no doubt areeffected by adding preparations of copper. 

"The sweetmeats which accompany these lines you will find exhibitvestiges of being contaminated with copper. --The practice of colouringthese articles of confectionery should, therefore, be banished: theproprietors of which are not aware of the deleterious quality of thesubstances employed by them. "

The foreign conserves, such as small green limes, citrons, hop-tops, plums, angelica roots, &c. Imported into this country, and usually soldin round chip boxes, are frequently impregnated with copper. 

The adulteration of confitures by means of clay, may be detected bysimply dissolving the comfits in a large quantity of boiling water. Theclay, after suffering the mixture to stand undisturbed for a few days, will fall to the bottom of the vessel; and on decanting the clear fluid, and suffering the sediment to become dry gradually, it may be obtainedin a separate state. If the adulteration has been effected by means ofclay, the obtained precipitate, on exposure to a red heat in the bowl ofa common tobacco-pipe, acquires a brick hardness. 

The presence of copper may be detected by pouring over the comfitsliquid ammonia, which speedily acquires a blue colour, if this metal bepresent. The presence of lead is rendered obvious by water impregnatedwith sulphuretted hydrogen, acidulated with muriatic acid (see p. 69, )which assumes a dark brown or black colour, if lead be present. 

FOOTNOTES:

[110] Philosoph. Mag. No. 258, vol. 54. 1819, p. 317. 

_Poisonous Catsup. _

This article is very often subjected to one of the most reprehensiblemodes of adulteration ever devised. Quantities are daily to be met with, which, on a chemical examination, are found to abound with copper. Indeed, this condiment is often nothing else than the residue leftbehind after the process employed for obtaining distilled vinegar, subsequently diluted with a decoction of the outer green husk of thewalnut, and seasoned with all-spice, Cayenne pepper, pimento, onions, and common salt. 

The quantity of copper which we have, more than once, detected in thissauce, used for seasoning, and which, on account of its cheapness, ismuch resorted to by people in the lower walks of life, has exceeded theproportion of lead to be met with in other articles employed in domesticeconomy. 

The following account of Mr. Lewis[111] on this subject, will besufficient to cause the public to be on their guard. 

"Being in the habit of frequently purchasing large quantities of picklesand other culinary sauces, for the use of my establishment, and also forforeign trade, it fell lately to my lot to purchase from a manufacturerof those commodities a quantity of walnut catsup, apparently of anexcellent quality; but, to my great surprise, I had reason to believethat the article might be contaminated with some deleterious substance, from circumstances which happened in my business as a tavern keeper, butwhich are unnecessary to be detailed here; and it was this that inducedme to make inquiry concerning the compounding of the suspected articles. 

"The catsup being prepared by boiling in a copper, as is usuallypractised, the outer green shell of walnuts, after having been sufferedto turn black on exposure to air, in combination with common salt, witha portion of pimento and pepper-dust, in common vinegar, strengthenedwith some vinegar extract, left behind as residue in the still ofvinegar manufacturers; I therefore suspected that the catsup might beimpregnated with some copper. To convince myself of this opinion. Iboiled down to dryness a quart of it in a stone pipkin, which yieldedto me a dark brown mass. I put this mass into a crucible, and kept it ina coal fire, red-hot, till it became reduced to a porous black charcoal;on urging the heat with a pair of bellows, and stirring the mass in thecrucible with the stem of a tobacco-pipe, it became, after two hours'exposure to an intense heat, converted into a greyish-white ash; but nometal could be discriminated amongst it. I now poured upon it some aquafortis, which dissolved nearly the whole of it, with an effervescence;and produced, after having been suffered to stand, to let the insolubleportion subside, a bright grass-green solution, of a strong metallictaste; after immersing into this solution the blade of a knife, itbecame instantly covered with a bright coat of copper. 

"The walnut catsup was therefore evidently strongly impregnated withcopper. On informing the manufacturer of this fact, he assured me thatthe same method of preparing the liquor was generally pursued, and thathe had manufactured the article in a like manner for upwards of twentyyears. 

"Such is the statement I wish to communicate; and if you will allow it aplace in your Literary Chronicle, it may perhaps tend to put the unwaryon their guard against the practice of preparing this sauce by boilingit in a copper, which certainly may contaminate the liquor, and renderit poisonous. "

FOOTNOTES:

[111] Literary Chronicle, No. 24, p. 379. 

_Poisonous Custard. _

The leaves of the cherry laurel, _prunus lauro-cerasus_, a poisonousplant, have a nutty flavour, resembling that of the kernels ofpeach-stones, or of bitter almonds, which to most palates is grateful. These leaves have for many years been in use among cooks, to communicatean almond or kernel-like flavour to custards, puddings, creams, _blanc-mange_, and other delicacies of the table. 

It has been asserted, that the laurel poison in custards and otherarticles of cookery is, on account of its being used in very smallquantities, quite harmless. To refute this assertion, numerous instancesmight be cited; and, among them, a recent one, in which four childrensuffered most severely from partaking of custard flavoured with theleaves of this poisonous plant. 

"Several children at a boarding-school, in the vicinity of Richmond, having partaken of some custard flavoured with the leaves of the cherrylaurel, as is frequently practised by cooks, four of the poor innocentswere taken severely ill in consequence. Two of them, a girl six years ofage, and a boy of five years old, fell into a profound sleep, out ofwhich they could not be roused. 

"Notwithstanding the various medical exertions used, the boy remained ina stupor ten hours; and the girl nine hours; the other two, one of whichwas six years old, a girl, and a girl of seven years, complained ofsevere pains in the epigastric region. They all recovered, after threedays' illness. I am anxious to communicate to you this fact, beingconvinced that your publication is read at all the scholasticestablishments in this part of the country. I hope you will allow theselines a corner in your Literary Chronicle, where they may contribute toput the unwary on their guard, against the deleterious effects offlavouring culinary dishes with that baneful herb, the Cherry Laurel. 

"I am, with respect, your's, Sir, "THOMAS LIDIARD. "[112]

What person of sense or prudence, then, would trust to the discretion ofan ignorant cook, in mixing so dangerous an ingredient in his puddingsand creams? Who but a maniac would choose to season his victuals withpoison?

The water distilled from cherry laurel leaves is frequently mixed withbrandy and other spiritous liquors, to impart to them the flavour of thecordial called _noyeau_, (see also page 195. )

This fluid, though long in frequent use as a flavouring substance, wasnot known to be poisonous until the year 1728; when the sudden death oftwo women, in Dublin, after drinking some of the common distilled cherrylaurel water, demonstrated its deleterious nature. 

FOOTNOTES:

[112] Literary Chronicle, No. 22, p. 348. --1819. 

_Poisonous Anchovy Sauce. _

Several samples which we have examined of this fish sauce have beenfound contaminated with lead. 

The mode of preparation of this fish sauce, consists in rubbing down thebroken anchovy in a mortar: and this triturated mass, being of a darkbrown colour, receives, without much risk of detection, a certainquantity of Venetian red, added for the purpose of colouring it, which, if genuine, is an innocent colouring substance; but instances haveoccurred of this pigment having been adulterated with orange lead, whichis nothing else than a better kind of minium, or red oxide of lead. Thefraud may be detected, as stated p. 229. 

The conscientious oilmen, less anxious with respect to colour, substitute for this poison the more harmless pigment, called Armenianbole. 

The following recipe for making this fish sauce is copied from Gray'sSupplement to the Pharmacopoeias, p. 241. 

"Anchovies, 2 lbs. To 4 lbs. And a half; pulp through a fine hair sieve;boil the bones with common salt, 7 oz. In water 6 lbs. ; strain; addflour 7 oz. And the pulp of the fish; boil; pass the whole through thesieve; colour with Venetian red to your fancy. It should produce onegallon. "

_Adulteration of Lozenges. _

Lozenges, particularly those into the composition of which substancesenter that are not soluble in water, as ginger, cremor tartar, magnesia, &c. , are often sophisticated. The adulterating ingredient is usuallypipe-clay, of which a liberal portion is substituted for sugar. Thefollowing detection of this fraud was lately made by Dr. T. Lloyd. [113]

"Some ginger lozenges having lately fallen into my hands, I was not alittle surprised to observe, accidentally, that when thrown into a coalfire, they suffered but little change. If one of the lozenges was laidon a shovel, previously made red-hot, it speedily took fire; but, instead of burning with a blaze and becoming converted into a charcoal, it took fire, and burnt with a feeble flame for scarcely half a minute, and there remained behind a stony hard substance, retaining the form ofthe lozenge. This unexpected result led me to examine these lozenges, which were bought at a respectable chemist's shop in the city; and Isoon became convinced, that, in the preparation of them, a considerablequantity of common pipe-clay had been substituted for sugar. On making acomplaint about this fraud at the shop where the article was sold, I wasinformed that there were two kinds of ginger lozenges kept for sale, theone at three-pence the ounce, and the other at six-pence per ounce; andthat the article furnished to me by mistake was the cheaper commodity:the latter were distinguished by the epithet _verum_, they beingcomposed of sugar and ginger only; but the former were manufacturedpartly of white Cornish clay, with a portion of sugar only, with gingerand Guinea pepper. I was likewise informed, that of Tolu lozenges, peppermint lozenges and ginger pearls, and several other sorts oflozenges, two kinds were kept; that the _reduced_ articles, as they werecalled, were manufactured for those very clever persons in their ownconceit, who are fond of haggling, and insist on buying better bargainsthan other people, shutting their eyes to the defects of an article, sothat they can enjoy the delight of getting it cheap; and, secondly forthose persons, who being but bad paymasters, yet, as the manufacturer, for his own credit's sake, cannot charge more than the usual price ofthe articles, he thinks himself therefore authorised to adulterate it invalue, to make up for the risk he runs, and the long credit he mustgive. "

The comfits called ginger pearls, are frequently adulterated with clay. These frauds may be detected in the manner stated, page 225. 

FOOTNOTES:

[113] Literary Gazette, No. 146. 

_Poisonous Olive Oil. _

This commodity is sometimes contaminated with lead, because the fruitwhich yields the oil is submitted to the action of the press betweenleaden plates; and it is, moreover, a practice (particularly in Spain)to suffer the oil to become clear in leaden cisterns, before it isbrought to market for sale. The French and Italian olive oil is usuallyfree from this impregnation. 

Olive oil is sometimes mixed with oil of poppy seeds: but, by exposingthe mixture to the freezing temperature, the olive oil freezes, whilethat of the poppy seeds remains fluid; and as oils which freeze withmost difficulty are most apt to become rancid, olive oil is deterioratedby the mixture of poppy oil. 

Good olive oil should have a pale yellow colour, somewhat inclining togreen; a bland taste, without smell; and should congeal at 38°Fahrenheit. In this country, it is frequently met with rancid. 

The presence of lead is detected by shaking, in a stopped vial, one partof the suspected oil, with two or three parts of water impregnated withsulphuretted hydrogen. This agent will render the oil of a dark brown orblack colour, if any metal, deleterious to health, be present. Thepractice of keeping this oil in pewter or leaden cisterns, as is oftenthe case, is objectionable; because the oil acts upon the metal. Thedealers in this commodity assert, that it prevents the oil from becomingrancid: and hence some retailers often suffer a pewter measure to remainimmersed in the oil. 

_Adulteration of Mustard. _

Genuine mustard, either in powder, or in the state of a paste ready foruse, is perhaps rarely to be met with in the shops. The article soldunder the name of _genuine Durham mustard_, is usually a mixture ofmustard and common wheaten flour, with a portion of Cayenne pepper, anda large quantity of bay salt, made with water into a paste, ready foruse. Some manufacturers adulterate their mustard with radish-seed andpease flour. 

It has often been stated, that a fine yellow colour is given to mustardby means of turmeric. We doubt the truth of this assertion. The presenceof the minutest quantity of turmeric may instantly be detected, byadding to the mustard a few drops of a solution of potash, or any otheralkali, which changes the bright yellow colour, to a brown or deeporange tint. 

Two ounces and a half of Cayenne pepper, 1-1/2 lbs. Of bay salt, 8 lbs. Of mustard flour, and 1-1/2 lbs. Of wheaten flour, made into a stiffpaste, with the requisite quantity of water, in which the bay-salt ispreviously dissolved, forms the so-called _genuine Durham mustard_, soldin pots. The salt and Cayenne pepper contribute materially to thekeeping of ready-made mustard. 

There is therefore nothing deleterious in the usual practice ofadulterating this commodity of the table. The fraud only tends todeteriorate the quality and flavour of the genuine article itself. 

_Adulteration of Lemon Acid. _

It is well known to every one, that the expressed juice of lemons isextremely apt to spoil, on account of the sugar, mucilage, andextractive matter which it contains; and hence various means have beenpractised, with the intention of rendering it less perishable, and lessbulky. The juice has been evaporated to the consistence of rob; but thisalways gives an unpleasant empyreumatic taste, and does not separate theforeign matters, so that it is still apt to spoil when agitated on boardof ship in tropical climates. It has been exposed to frost, and part ofthe water removed under the form of ice; but this is liable to all theformer objections; and, besides, where lemons are produced in sufficientquantity, there is not a sufficient degree of cold. The addition of aportion of spirit to the inspissated juice, separates the mucilage, butnot the extractive matter and the sugar. By means, however, ofseparating the foreign matters associated with it, in the juice, bychemical processes unnecessary to be detailed here, citric acid is nowmanufactured, perfectly pure, and in a crystallised form, and is soldunder the name of concrete lemon acid. In this state it is extremelyconvenient, both for domestic and medicinal purposes. One drachm, whendissolved in one ounce of water, is equal in strength to a like bulk offresh lemon juice. To communicate the lemon flavour, it is onlynecessary to rub a lump of sugar on the rind of a lemon to becomeimpregnated with a portion of the essential oil of the fruit, and to addthe sugar to the lemonade, negus, punch, shrub, jellies or culinarysauces, prepared with the pure citric acid. 

Fraudulent dealers often substitute the cheaper tartareous acid, forcitric acid. The negus and lemonade made by the pastry-cooks, and theliquor called punch, sold at taverns in this metropolis, is usually madewith tartareous acid. 

To discriminate citric acid from tartareous acid, it is only necessaryto add a concentrated solution of the suspected acid, to a concentratedsolution of muriate of potash, taking care that the solution of the acidis in excess. If a precipitate ensues, the fraud is obvious, becausecitric acid does not produce a precipitate with a solution of muriateor potash. 

Or, by adding to a saturated solution of tartrate of potash, a saturatedsolution of the suspected acid, in excess, which produces with it analmost insoluble precipitate in minute granular crystals. Pure citricacid produces no such effect when added in excess to tartrate ofpotash. 

_Poisonous Mushrooms. _

Mushrooms have been long used in sauces and other culinary preparations;yet there are numerous instances on record of the deleterious effects ofsome species of these _fungi_, almost all of which are fraught withpoison. [114] Pliny already exclaims against the luxury of his countrymenin this article, and wonders what extraordinary pleasure there can be ineating such dangerous food. [115]

But if the palate must be indulged with these treacherous luxuries, or, as Seneca calls them, "voluptuous poison, "[116] it is highly necessarythat the mild eatable mushrooms, should be gathered by persons skilfulenough to distinguish the good from the false, or poisonous, which isnot always the case; nor are the characters which distinguish themstrongly marked. 

The following statement is published by Mr. Glen, surgeon, ofKnightsbridge:

"A poor man, residing in Knightsbridge, took a walk in Hyde Park, withthe intention of gathering some mushrooms. He collected a considerablenumber, and, after stewing them, began to eat them. He had finished thewhole, with the exception of about six or eight, when, about eight orten minutes from the commencement of his meal, he was suddenly seizedwith a dimness, or mist before his eyes, a giddiness of the head, with ageneral trembling and sudden loss of power;--so much so, that he nearlyfell off the chair; to this succeeded loss of recollection: he forgotwhere he was, and all the circumstances of his case. This deprivationsoon went off, and he so far rallied as to be able, though withdifficulty, to get up, with the intention of going to Mr. Glen forassistance--a distance of about five hundred yards: he had not proceededmore than half way, when his memory again failed him; he lost his road, although previously well acquainted with it. He was met by a friend, whowith difficulty learned his state, and conducted him to Mr. Glen'shouse. His countenance betrayed great anxiety: he reeled about, like adrunken man, and was greatly inclined to sleep; his pulse was low andfeeble. Mr. Glen immediately gave him an emetic draught. The poison hadso diminished the sensibility of the stomach, that vomiting did not takeplace for near twenty minutes, although another draught had beenexhibited. During this interval his drowsiness increased to such adegree, that he was only kept awake by obliging him to walk round theroom with assistance; he also, at this time, complained of distressingpains in the calves of his legs. --Full vomiting was at length produced. After the operation of the emetic, he expressed himself generallybetter, but still continued drowsy. In the evening Mr. Glen found himdoing well. "

The following case is recorded in the Medical Transactions, vol. Ii. 

"A middle-aged man having gathered what he called champignons, they werestewed, and eaten by himself and his wife; their child also, about fouryears old, ate a little of them, and the sippets of bread which were putinto the liquor. Within five minutes after eating them, the man began tostare in an unusual manner, and was unable to shut his eyes. Allobjects appeared to him coloured with a variety of colours. He felt apalpitation in what he called his stomach; and was so giddy, that hecould hardly stand. He seemed to himself swelled all over his body. Hehardly knew what he did or said; and sometimes was unable to speak atall. These symptoms continued in a greater or less degree fortwenty-four hours; after which, he felt little or no disorder. Soonafter he perceived himself ill, one scruple of white vitriol was givenhim, and repeated two or three times, with which he vomited plentifully. 

"The woman, aged thirty-nine, felt all the same symptoms, but in ahigher degree. She totally lost her voice and her senses, and was eitherstupid, or so furious that it was necessary she should be held. Thewhite vitriol was offered to her, of which she was capable of taking butvery little; however, after four or five hours, she was much recovered:but she continued many days far from being well, and from enjoying herformer health and strength. She frequently fainted for the first weekafter; and there was, during a month longer, an uneasy sense of heat andweight in her breast, stomach, and bowels, with great flatulence. Herhead was, at first waking, much confused; and she often experiencedpalpitations, tremblings, and other hysteric affections, to all whichshe had ever before been a stranger. 

"The child had some convulsive agitations of his arms, but was otherwiselittle affected. He was capable of taking half a scruple of ipecacuanha, with which he vomited, and was soon perfectly recovered. "

MUSHROOM CATSUP. 

The edible mushroom is the basis of the sauce called mushroom catsup; agreat proportion of which is prepared by gardeners who grow the fungi. The mushrooms employed for preparing this sauce are generally thosewhich are in a putrefactive state, and not having found a ready sale inthe market; for no vegetable substance is liable to so rapid aspontaneous decomposition as mushrooms. In a few days after the fungushas been removed from the dung-bed on which it grows, it becomes thehabitation of myriads of insects; and, if even the saleable mushroom beattentively examined, it will frequently be found to swarm with life. 

FOOTNOTES:

[114] Fungi plerique veneno turgent. Linn. Amæn. Acad. 

[115] Quæ voluptas tanta ancipitis cibi?--Plin. Nat. Hist. Xxii. 23. 

[116] Sen. Ep. 95. 

_Poisonous Soda Water. _

The beverage called soda water is frequently contaminated both withcopper and lead; these metals being largely employed in the constructionof the apparatus for preparing the carbonated water, [117] and the greatexcess of carbonic acid which the water contains, particularly enablesit to act strongly on the metallic substances of the apparatus; a truth, of which the reader will find no difficulty in convincing himself, bysuffering a stream of sulphuretted hydrogen gas to pass through thewater. --See p. 70. 

FOOTNOTES:

[117] Some manufacturers have been hence induced to construct theapparatus for manufacturing soda water wholly either of earthenware orof glass. Mr. Johnston, of Greek Street, Soho, was the first who pointedout to the public the absolute necessity of this precaution. 

_Food poisoned by Copper Vessels. _

Many kinds of viands are frequently impregnated with copper, inconsequence of the employment of cooking utensils made of that metal. Bythe use of such vessels in dressing food, we are daily liable to bepoisoned; as almost all acid vegetables, as well as sebaceous or pinguidsubstances, employed in culinary preparations, act upon copper, anddissolve a portion of it; and too many examples are met with of fatalconsequences having ensued from eating food which had been dressed incopper vessels not well cleaned from the oxide of copper which they hadcontracted by being exposed to the action of air and moisture. 

The inexcusable negligence of persons who make use of copper vessels hasbeen productive of mortality, so much more terrible, as they haveexerted their action on a great number of persons at once. The annals ofmedicine furnish too many examples in support of this assertion, torender it necessary to insist more upon it here. 

Mr. Thiery, who wrote a thesis on the noxious quality of copper, observes, that "our food receives its quantity of poison in the kitchenby the use of copper pans and dishes. The brewer mingles poison in ourbeer, by boiling it in copper vessels. The sugar-baker employs copperpans; the pastry-cook bakes our tarts in copper moulds; the confectioneruses copper vessels: the oilman boils his pickles in copper or brassvessels, and verdigris is plentifully formed by the action of thevinegar upon the metal. 

"Though, after all, a single dose be not mortal, yet a quantity ofpoison, however small, when taken at every meal, must produce more fataleffects than are generally apprehended; and different constitutions aredifferently affected by minute quantities of substances that actpowerfully on the system. "

The author of a tract, entitled, "Serious Reflections on the Dangersattending the Use of Copper Vessels, " asserts that a numerous andfrightful train of diseases is occasioned by the poisonous effects ofpernicious matter received into the stomach insensibly with ourvictuals. 

Dr. Johnston[118] gives an account of the melancholy catastrophe ofthree men being poisoned, after excruciating sufferings, in consequenceof eating food cooked in an unclean copper vessel, on board the Cyclopsfrigate; and, besides these, thirty-three men became ill from the samecause. 

The following case[119] is related by Sir George Baker, M. D. 

"Some cyder, which had been made in a gentleman's family, being thoughttoo sour, was boiled with honey in a brewing vessel, the rim of whichwas capped with lead. All who drank this liquor were seized with a bowelcolic, more or less violently. One of the servants died very soon inconvulsions; several others were cruelly tortured a long time. Themaster of the family, in particular, notwithstanding all the assistancewhich art could give him, never recovered his health; but diedmiserably, after having almost three years languished under a mosttedious and incurable malady. "

Too much care and attention cannot be taken in preserving all culinaryutensils of copper, in a state unexceptionably fit for their destinedpurpose. They should be frequently tinned, and kept thoroughly clean, nor should any food ever be suffered to remain in them for a longer timethan is absolutely necessary to their preparation for the table. But thesure preventive of its pernicious effect, is, to banish copper utensilsfrom the kitchen altogether. 

The following wholesome advice on this subject is given to cooks by theauthor of an excellent cookery book. [120]

"Stew-pans and soup-kettles should be examined every time they are used;these, and their covers, must be kept perfectly clean and well tinned, not only on the inside, but about a couple of inches on the outside; somuch mischief arises from their getting out of repair; and, if not keptnicely tinned, all your work will be in vain; the broths and soups willlook green and dirty, and taste bitter and poisonous, and will bespoiled both for the eye and palate, and your credit will be lost; andas the health, and even the life, of the family depends upon this; thecook may be sure her employer had rather pay the tin-man's bill thanthe doctor's. "

The senate of Sweden, in the year 1753, prohibited copper vessels, andordered that none but such as were made of iron should be used in theirfleet and armies. 

FOOTNOTES:

[118] Johnston's Essay on Poison, p. 102. 

[119] Medical Transactions, vol. I. P. 213. 

[120] Apicius Redivivus, p. 91. 

_Food Poisoned by Leaden Vessels. _

Various kinds of food used in domestic economy, are liable to becomeimpregnated with lead. 

The glazing of the common cream-coloured earthen ware, which is composedof an oxide of lead, readily yields to the action of vinegar and salinecompounds; and therefore jars and pots of this kind of stone ware, arewholly unfit to contain jellies of fruits, marmalade, and similarconserves. Pickles should in no case be deposited in cream-colouredglazed earthenware. 

The custom which still prevails in some parts of this country of keepingmilk in leaden vessels for the use of the dairy, is very improper. 

"In Lancashire[121] the dairies are furnished with milk-pans made oflead: and when Mr. Parks expostulated with some individuals on thedanger of this practice, he was told that _leaden_ milk-pans throw upthe cream much better than vessels of any other kind. 

"In some parts of the north of England it is customary for theinn-keepers to prepare mint-salad by bruising and grinding the vegetablein a large wooden bowl with a _ball of lead_ of twelve or fourteenpounds weight. In this operation the mint is cut, and portions of thelead are ground off at every revolution of the ponderous instrument. Inthe same county, it is a common practice to have brewing-coppersconstructed with the bottom of copper and the whole sides of lead. "

The baking of fruit tarts in cream-coloured earthenware, and the saltingand preserving of meat in leaden pans, are no less objectionable. Allkinds of food which contain free vegetable acids, or salinepreparations, attack utensils covered with a glaze, in the compositionof which lead enters as a component part. The leaden beds of presses forsqueezing the fruit in cyder countries, have produced incalculablemischief. These consequences never follow, when the lead is combinedwith tin; because this metal, being more eager for oxidation, preventsthe solution of the lead. 

When we consider the various unsuspected means by which the poisons oflead and copper gain admittance into the human body, a very common butdangerous instance presents itself: namely, the practice of paintingtoys, made for the amusement of children, with poisonous substances, viz. Red lead, verdigris, &c. Children are apt to put every thing, especially what gives them pleasure, into their mouths; the painting oftoys with colouring substances that are poisonous, ought therefore to beabolished; a practice which lies the more open to censure, as it is ofno real utility. 

FOOTNOTES:

[121] Park's Chemical Essays, vol. V. P. 193. 

INDEX. 

A

Adulteration of anchovy sauce, 234 beer, 113 brandy, 187 bread, 98 catsup, 227 cayenne pepper, 215 cheese, 206 coffee, 176 confectionery, 224 cream, 222 custard, 231 gin, 187 lemon acid, 243 lozenges, 236 malt spirits, 197 mustard, 241 olive oil, 239 pepper, 211 pickles, 217 porter, 113 rum, 187 soda water, 251 tea, black, 173 green, 173 vinegar, 173 distilled, 221 wine, 74

Age of beer, how fraudulently imitated, 148

Alcohol, quantity contained in different kinds of wine, 94 malt liquors, 126 spiritous liquors, 205

Ale, Burton, quantity of spirit which it contains, 162 Dorchester, ditto ditto, 162 Edinburgh, ditto ditto, 162 Home-brewed ditto ditto, 162

Alum, bleaching property in the panification of bread flour, 104 method of detecting it in bread, 108 for brightening muddy wines, 74 clarifying spiritous liquors, 200 adulterating beer, 134

Arrack, imitation of, 196 Batavia, quantity of alcohol contained in it, 205

Arrow root, sophistication of, 29

B

Bakers, their methods of judging of the goodness of bread flour, 111

Beer, adulteration of, 113 act prohibiting it, 114 method of detecting it, 158 with narcotic substances, 150 with opium, tobacco, &c. , 150 colouring of, act prohibiting it, 123 heading, composition and use of, 134 hard, what is meant by it, 148 fraudulent method of producing it, 148 half-spoiled, fraudulent practice of recovering it, 149 illegal substances used for adulterating it, 131 old, what is meant by it, 144 quantity of spirit contained in different kinds, 160 strong, adulteration of with small beer, 140 act prohibiting it, 140 how defined by law, 128 strength of different kinds, 125

Bilberries, employed for colouring port wine, 74

Bittern, for adulterating beer, 18

Black Extract, for adulterating beer, 150

Bland, Mr. Tragical catastrophe of, 81

Bouquet of high-flavoured wines, how produced, 75

Brandy, adulteration of, 187 and method of detecting it, 195 complexion of, what is meant by it, 195

Brandy flavour of, how imitated, 193 imitative, manufacture of, 194 method of compounding for retail trade, 195 quantity contained in different sorts of wine, 94 of alcohol contained in different kinds of, 205 legal strength, 190 how discovered by the Excise, 188 false strength, 195 flavour, imitative, how produced, 193

Brazil wood, application of for colouring wine, 74

Bread, adulteration of with alum, 98 methods of detecting it, 108 with potatoes, 105 goodness of, how estimated in this metropolis, 98 how rendered white and firm, 99 corn, method of judging its goodness, 110 flour, different sorts of from the same kind of grain, 99 adulteration of with bean flour, 99 process of making five bushels into bread, 102 made from new corn, improvement of, 107 method of judging of goodness, 110

Brewers, list of, prosecuted for using illegal substances in their brewings, 151 convicted of adulterating their strong beer with table beer, 143 Druggists, 119 prosecuted for supplying illegal ingredients to brewers for adulterating beer, 119

Breweries, illegal substances seized at various, 136

Brown Stout, quantity of spirit contained in it, 126

C

Calcavella, quantity of brandy which it contains, 95

Carbonate of ammonia, used by fraudulent bakers, 105

Catsup, adulteration of, 227

Claret, quantity of brandy which it contains, 95

Clary, used for flavouring wine, 75

Cheese, poisonous, and method of detecting it, 206

Chemists, are not permitted to sell illegal ingredients to brewers for adulterating beer, 118 list of, convicted of this fraud, 119

Cherry-laurel water, dangerous application of for flavouring creams, &c. , 231 used in the manufacture of spurious wines, 75 in the manufacture of brandy, 195

Citric Acid, adulteration of, 244 method of detecting, 245

Cocculus indicus, nefarious application of in the brewing of beer, 18 early law prohibiting its application, 115 brewers prosecuted for using it, 152 seizures made of at different breweries, 136 narcotic property of, to what owing, 153 extract of, application in brewing, 136

Coffee, adulteration of, 176 law in force against it, 177 grocers lately convicted of selling spurious, 176

Confectionery, adulteration of, 224 methods of detecting it, 225

Conserves, contamination of with copper, 226 should never be deposited in vessels glazed with lead, 257

Constantia, quantity of spirit which it contains, 94

Copperas, or salt of steel, publicans convicted of mixing it with their beer, 129 seizures of, at various breweries, 136

Cream, adulteration of, and mode of detecting it, 222

Custards, flavoured with cherry laurel leaves, dangerous effects from it, 231

Cyder, melancholy catastrophe of persons drinking such as was contaminated with lead, 254

E

Elder-berries are used for colouring port wine, 74 flowers are used for flavouring insipid white wines, 75

Entire beer, origin of its name, 144 composition of, 146

Extract of cocculus indicus is used by fraudulent brewers, 136

F

False strength, how given to wine and spiritous liquors, 19, 192 how given to vinegar, 220

Flavour of French brandy, how imitated, 194

Flour, new, of an indifferent quality, how rendered fit for being made into good and wholesome bread, 107 different sorts, from the same kind of grain, 99 sour, practice of converting it into bread, 105

Food, rendered poisonous by copper vessels, 252 by leaden vessels, 257

Frothy head of porter, how artificially produced, 133

G

Geneva, Dutch, quantity of alcohol which it contains, 205

Gin, adulteration of, 187 quantity of alcohol contained in different sorts, 205 dangerous method of clarifying, 202 legal exactment of its saleable strength, 197 _proof_, what is meant by this term, 188 strength of, how ascertained by the Excise, 188 sweetened, fraudulent practice of composing it for sale, 200 unsweetened, ditto ditto, 200 false strength, how given, 202

H

Hermitage, quantity of brandy which it contains, 95

Hops, adulteration of, prohibited by law, 132 its chemical action upon beer, 133

Hydrometer, legal, now in use for ascertaining the strength of spiritous liquors, 187

Hyson tea, spurious. See Tea leaves

I

Imitation arrack, 196 tea. See Tea leaves coffee. See Coffee

L

Leaden pumps and water reservoirs, dangerous effects to be apprehended from them, 62

Lisbon, quantity of spirit which it contains, 94

Lozenges, adulteration of, 236

Lemon acid, adulteration of, 243 method of detecting it, 244

M

Madeira, quantity of brandy which it contains, 94

Malaga, quantity of brandy contained in it, 94

Malt, patent, for colouring porter, 123 disadvantages of, 124 liquors, dangerous adulteration of, 115 strength of different kinds. See Porter, 126 spirits, adulterations of, 197 characteristic flavour, to what owing, 197 nefarious practices of compounding them for sale, 199 false strength, how given, 202 act restricting the strength of it, 197

Meat, salted, should not be preserved in leaden vessels, 258

Milk, improper practice of keeping it in leaden vessels, 257

Mint salad, pernicious custom of preparing it, 258

Multum, a substance employed for adulterating beer, 17 seizures of, at various breweries, 136

Mushroom, poisonous, 246 Catsup, 250

Mustard, adulteration of, 241

O

Oak-wood saw-dust, is used in the manufacture of spurious port wine, 75 in the manufacture of spurious brandy, 194

Orris-root, is used for flavouring insipid wines, 75

Olive oil, contamination of, with lead, and method of detecting it, 239

P

Pickles, contamination of with copper, 219 improper vessels for keeping them, 257

Pepper, black, adulteration of, 211 law in force against it, 213

Poisonous Cheese, 206 Cayenne pepper, 215 catsup, 227 custard, 231 olive oil, 239 mushroom, 246 pickles, 207 soda water, 251

Porter, origin of its name, 121 adulteration of with wormwood, 132 act prohibiting it, 113 average strength of, as furnished to the publican, 126 ditto, as sent out by the retailers, 127 illegal substances for adulterating it, 131 brewers, convicted of adulterating their porter with illegal ingredients, 151

Porter, frothy head of, how produced, 133 method of ascertaining the strength of different kinds, 160 quantity of alcohol contained in London porter, 162

Port wine, adulteration of, 74

Publicans, prosecuted for adulterating their strong beer with table beer, 129

Q

Quassia, fraudulent substitution of, for hops, 131 disadvantages of its application, 132 seizures of, at various breweries, 137

R

Raisin wine, quantity of brandy which it contains, 94

Rum, adulteration of, 187 false strength, how given to it, 202 is seizable, if sold, unless of a certain strength, 189 quantity of alcohol contained in it, 205

S

Soda Water, poisonous, and method of detecting it, 251

Spiritous Liquors, adulteration of, 187 dangerous practice of fining them with noxious ingredients, 202 quantity of alcohol contained in different kinds, 205

Sweetmeats, adulteration of, 224

Sweet-brier, use of it for flavouring wines, 75

T

Tarts of fruits, should not be baked in earthenware vessels glazed with lead, 258

Tea leaves, adulteration of, 171 method of detecting it, 171 law in force against it, 163 poisonous sophistication of, 173 method of detecting it, 174 coloring of, with verdigris, 168 black, spurious, process of manufacturing it, 168 green, imitation of, 169

Tea dealers, convicted for selling adulterated tea, 169

Toys, improper practice of painting them with poisonous colours, 259

V

Vidonia, quantity of brandy contained in it, 95

Vin de Grave, ditto ditto, 95

Vinegar, adulteration of, and method of detecting it, 220 distilled, and method of ascertaining its strength, 221

W

Water, characters of good, 37 chemical constitution of those used in domestic economy and the arts, 33 danger of keeping it in leaden reservoirs, 60 hard, how softened and rendered fit for washing, 39 New River, constitution of, 38, 45 substances contained in potable, 48 how detected, 50 substances usually contained in spring, 42 taste and salubrious quality, to what owing, 33 Thames, constitution of, 46, 48

Wine, adulteration of with alum, 74 British port, 77 champaigne, 77 bottles, improper practice of cleaning them, 85 bottle corks, practice of staining them red, 79

Wine doctors, 80 quantity of alcohol contained in various kinds, 94, 95 dangerous practice of fining them, 83 to prevent them turning sour, 84 art of flavouring them, 75 home-made, chemical constitution of, 96 improvement from age, to what owing, 91 Southampton port, 78 strength of, on what it depends, 92 specific differences of different kinds, to what owing, 89 test, 86 white, manufacture of, from red grapes, 90

Whiskey, Irish, flavour, to what owing, 197 strength of, 205 Scotch, ditto, 205

Wormwood, substitution of, for hops, 132

THE END. 

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:

Greek words in this text have been transliteratedand placed between +marks+. 

The word "Pharmacopoeias" used an "oe" ligature in the original. 

Unusual spellings, variations in spellings, and variations inhyphenation have been left as in the original. Examples include:

 inpregnating transparant coculus/cocculus inconscious orris/oris root

The following corrections have been made to the text:

 page iii--comma added after "beer" in "beer, pepper, and other articles of diet"

 page x--changed period to comma after "Ale" in "Method of ascertaining the Quantity of Spirit contained in Porter, Ale, &c. "

 page 61--changed "where" to "were" in "When men were unable to detect the poisonous matters"

 page 62--corrected spelling of "snd" to "and" in "by Hyppocrates, Galen, and Vitruvius"

 page 78--added "t" to "yeas" and added period at end of "before it is cold, add some yeast and ferment. "

 page 98--corrected spelling of "indipensable" to "indispensable" in "degree of whiteness rendered indispensable by the caprice of the consumers"

 page 104--changed comma to period after "sufficient for a sack of flour"

 page 113--changed comma to period after "made of these ingredients only, are entirely deceived"

 page 120--corrected "Authur" to "Arthur" in "Arthur Waller" and corrected "Dun" to "Dunn" in "John Dunn"

 page 126--added period after "Co" in "Messrs. Barclay, Perkins, and Co"

 page 129--added period after "l" in "strong beer, 20l"

 page 130--added comma after "Harbur" in "John Harbur, for using salt of steel"

 page 140--added ending quote mark after "of them from brewers' druggists, within these two years past. "

 page 149--changed comma to period after "resorted to only by fraudulent brewers"

 page 152--changed semi-colon after "Stephens" in "Septimus Stephens, brewer"

 page 154--corrected spelling of "apolexy" to "apoplexy" in "drinkers are very liable to apoplexy"

 page 169--corrected spelling of "Malin's" to "Malins'" in "Malins' coffee-roasting premises"

 page 185--corrected spelling of "find" to "fined" in "were fined 20l. Each"

 page 202--added the word "on" in "as stated on pages 70 and 86"

 page 210--corrected spelling of "annotta" to "anotta" in "who adulterated the anotta"

 page 222--added hyphen in "arrow-root"

 page 223--added hyphen in "tea-spoonful" and corrected spelling of "jodine" to "iodine" in "few drops of a solution of iodine"

 page 227--added "s" at end of "Mr. Lewi "

 page 231--corrected spelling of "cookry" to "cookery" in "articles of cookery"

 page 245--corrected spelling of "glanular" to "granular" in "insoluble precipitate in minute granular crystals"

 Footnote 46--added period after "p" in "3d edit. P. 270"

 Footnote 87--added missing end quote after "with copperas and sheep's dung. " and removed extraneous period after "48" in "Plant, p. 48;"

 Footnote 115--corrected spelling of "Qvæ" to "Quæ" in "Quæ voluptas tanta ancipitis cibi?"