APPENDIX.

Thoughthis work has already been carried to a great length, I hope those of my readers, who may have done me the honor to go attentively through the whole of it, will pardon me the addition of a few incidental thoughts and queries. The chain of arts is so well connected, that researches originally intended for the illustration of any one of them, can hardly fail of throwing some light upon others.

1. The seed of plants cannot be put in a fitter place, for perfect vegetation, than when buried under ground, at a depth sufficient to defend the young shoots from the vicissitudes of heat and cold, and the disadvantage of too much moisture. The manuring of the earth, and the steeping the seed into solutions of salts, have been found, in some cases, to increase the strength of the grain, to correct its original defects, and to prevent the noxious impressions of a vicious ground. Plants are made to germinate in water alone, and this experiment so successfully carried on every winter, in warm apartments, may still be improved by dissolving salts in the water.—Could the barley used for malting be put in the ground, its growth would be more natural, and its oils becoming more miscible with water, by the saline nourishment derived from the earth, might yield more vinous, morestrong, and more lasting liquors. But as this method is impracticable, would it be impossible to increase the efficacy of that which is used? Consult Home on agriculture: might not either nitre or salt petre be added to the water, with which the grain is moistened? are they not used with success to manure land? Are not solutions of them in water employed by the farmer to steep his sowing seed? I barely mention these as some of the substances, that might be employed in the malting of barley, and am far from thinking there are none other. Perhaps different salts should be used, according to the nature of the soil, from which the corn was produced; but a variety of experiments seems to be required, in order to discover how far art might in this case imitate and improve nature.

2. A small quantity of malt, at all times, but especially when brewed in large vessels, parts too readily with the heat which extraction requires; and, on the contrary, if the quantity of malt be very great, the heat may not be uniformly spread. A forward beer inclinable to acidity is often the result of too short a grist; a thick, stubborn, and rank liquor many times is produced from too large a one. Every advantage may be had in brewing, properly, five or six quarters of malt; it is difficult to succeed if the number exceeds fifty.

3. The strong pungent volatile spirit, which exhales from a must, when under full fermentation, has beensupposed to be a loss, which might be prevented; and accordingly attempts have been made to retain these flying impetuous particles, by stopping the communication between the atmosphere and the fermenting drink. That there is a dispersion of spirits is beyond doubt, and that these exhaling vapors consist of the finest oils, which the heat forces out of the must, is equally certain. But this loss seems to be abundantly repaid by the stronger oils, which the same degree of heat attenuates and substitutes, in a larger quantity, to the former. The last oils could never come under the form of a vinous liquor, but by a power, which sooner or later dissipates some of the first. Pale ales or amber not only lay, for many days, exposed to the open air, but suffer, by the periodical renewal of the action of the air, every two or four hours, a much more considerable loss of spirits, than when fermentation is carried on uniformly. Yet experience shews, that so many oils are, by this method, attenuated, that the strength acquired greatly surpasses that which is lost.

4. The practice of fermentingby compression, recommended to distillers, seems, on this account, less useful, than might be concluded from theory alone; the intent of the distiller, as well as of the brewer, is to extract the greatest quantity of spiritous oils. It is impossible to ferment a mustin vacuo; air is absolutely necessary to carry on this operation, even a superabundant quantity of oils admitted into the must, by obstructing the freeadmission of the air, impedes fermentation, prevents the wine from reaching pellucidity, and sometimes is the occasion of its becoming putrid.

5. When the purest spirit is intended to be drawn from the grain, the fermented wash ought to be suffered to settle, till it becomes transparent. The dispatch, with which the distillery is generally carried on, often prevents this useful circumstance taking place, and occasions a want of vinosity in the liquor. In many cases, the extraordinary charges of extracting the grist from malted corn, in the manner, which has been directed for drinks intended a short space to be kept, and of suffering the fermented wash to be meliorated by time, until it becomes vinous and spontaneously transparent, might be abundantly repaid. Yet, if hurry must be a part of the distiller’s business, he should at least make such extractions as admit of the speediest fermentation and the readiest pellucidity. He cannot expect corn spirits to equal the brandies of France, unless his worts are similar to the wines distilled in that kingdom, where those used for this purpose are weak, fine, and tending to acidity.42He wouldtherefore secure to himself the greatest probability of success, if he employed only malted corn in his grist, this of the best kind, well germinated to form a saccharine basis, slack dried, and resolved, with weak extracts, to preserve into the must a proper proportion of vinosity. If he intended this wash to be formed into a pure spirit, it should be allowed time to become transparent; he might regulate his extracts by such heats as have been fixed for common small beer, brewed when the heat of the air is at the lowest fermentable degree, though perhaps heats less than these, when dispatch is required, might better answer his purpose, especially as the length used in the distillery is nearly the same with that which brewers use for the liquor here referred to. With hot waters to attempt to force from the grain more strength or more oils, than such as will form a clean tasteless spirit, is, in the distillery, a real loss and a fundamental error. By too strong heats, more oils are forced into the must than can be converted in spirits; and fermentation being, by this over charge, in some measure, clogged and impeded, a less yield is made, and the liquor obtained of a rank and often empyreumatic taste.

6. Why are the brandies of Spain inferior to those prepared in France? The wines of the last country are the growth of a weaker sun; they contain no more oils than can be assimilated by fermentation, and form a clean, dry, nutty spirit. The Spanish wines aboundingwith more oleaginous than acid parts, this over proportion becomes not only useless, but hurtful in the still, and produces the rankness observed in Spanish brandies. The cleanness of the spirit arises, in great measure, from the weakness of the must, and its vinosity from a less proportion of oils to the salts. This seems to be the reason why the most grateful spirits are produced from wines unable to bear the sea, or to be long kept.

7. The native spirits of vegetables, says Boerhaave, are separated by heats between 94 degrees, and 212. To obtain the whole of these, the fire must be gradually increased; for a superior heat dissipates the spirits raised by an inferior one. Such parts as might be obtained by 100 degrees, are lost if the heat applied be much greater. It is true, the parts of vegetables immersed in water, cannot so easily be dissipated as if they were in open air, yet, by the rarefaction of the liquid, a proportional evaporation, however small, must ensue, or the oils raised by a greater heat may so effectually envelope the finer ones, as to make them hardly perceptible either to our smell or taste. Thus, though heated water is able to extract all the virtues residing in the vegetables, the different application of the fire will alter not only their proportions, but their properties also, when we consider that pure spirit of wine boils at so low a heat as 175 degrees. If the above principles be true, that surely must be the cleanest spirit which is brought over in theslowest and coolest manner; and it is more than probable, if the rules here laid down be put in practice, the grain of England will be found to yield spirits that may vie with the brandies of France, be more pure than those of the Indies, and excel those of Holland.

8. The vinegar maker is equally concerned with the distiller in the brewing process. Vinegar is produced in the last stage of fermentation, when a gross, tartareous, unctous matter, consisting of the coarser oils extracted either from the grain or the grapes, generally falls to the bottom of the liquor, and no longer prevents its acidity, or affects its flavor. Though the best vinegar proceeds either from the strongest wines or beers, this strength consists in the quantity of fermentable principles, and not in that of mere oleaginous parts. By properly adapting the extracting waters, this hurtful impediment may be removed, and the vinegar from malt liquors become as neat and as strong as that which is made from wine.

9. As the acid taste of vinegar is the effect of a continued fermentation, many people have thought it immaterial how speedily the first parts of the operation were carried on. But violent fermentations not only dissipate some of the fine oils, which should be retained in the vinegar, but also cause the must to tend towards putrefaction. Boerhaave, after he has directed a frequent transvasion of the liquor, observes that, whenever theweather or the workhouse is very hot, it is often necessary to fill the half emptied vessels every twelve hours, not only to procure a supply of acids from the air, but also to cool the wine, and check the too violent fermentation, which arising in the half full casks, might dissipate the volatile spirits, before they are properly secured and entangled by the acid. Hence the liquor might be sour indeed, but at the same time flat, and would never become a sharp and strong vinegar.

10. Application and uses have frequently been found for materials, which before were supposed to be of no value. The grains, after the brewer has drawn his worts out of them, are generally used for the feeding of cattle; but I do not know that hops, after boiling, have been employed to any purpose. Is there nothing more left in this vegetable, after it has imparted the virtue wanted to the beer? All plants burnt in open air yield alkaline salts, though in a greater or less quantity, according to the quality of the plants. Boerhaave says that those which are austere, acid, or aromatic, yield in their ashes a great abundance of salts, and these being put in fusion, and mixed with flint or sand, run into glass. Hops thrown, after decoction, in no great quantity on the fire, cause the coals to vitrify, or as it is generally termed, torun into clinkers. If therefore the remains of the hops were burnt in open air, or in a proper furnace, it seems most likely that no inconsiderablequantity of somewhat like pot ashes might be obtained, and this, considering the many tun weight of hops employed in large cities, and thrown away as useless, might become an object of private emolument to the brewer, and of public benefit to the kingdom.

FINIS.

1Vide Dr. Pringle’s experiments in his book of observations on the diseases of the army, p. 350, 351 & seq.

2There is a very singular exception in regard to iron itself, in this respect. It is only a certain degree of heat that expands this metal; (and that much less than any other either more or less dense) when melted, it occupies a less space than when in a solid form. This ought to caution us against an entire dependence on general rules, by which nature doth not appear to be wholly restricted. See Mem. de l’Acad. des Scienc. p. 273.

3See Dr. Lewis’s Philosophical Commerce of Arts, p. 42.

4See Martine’s Dissertation on Heat. What the degree of cold was which fixed mercury at St. Petersburg, I do not recollect.

5It requires seven or eight days. (See Dissertation sur la glace par Mons. de Mayran.) Paris edition, 1749. Page 191.

6Lately, indeed, by such intense cold as can only be procured with the greatest art, and in the coldest climates, mercury is said to have been stagnated, or fixed.

7By Dr. Hales’s experiments made for discovering the proportion of air generated from different bodies, it appears that raisin wine, absorbed, in fermenting, a quantity of air equal to nearly one third of its volume; and ale, under the like circumstances, absorbed one fifth.

8In the northern part of England, the usual time of steeping barley in the cistern is about 80 hours.40 bushels of barley wetted 1 hour, will guage then in the couch 40 bushels, that is, if drained from its exterior moisture.40 bushels——20 hours,————42½ bushels.40 bushels——40 hours,————45 bushels.40 bushels——60 hours,————47½ bushels.40 bushels——80 hours,————50 bushels.Here the barley is supposed to be fully saturated with the water; and these 40 bushels of barley, guaged (after 80 hours wetting in the cistern) in the couch, will be 50 bushels; but when again guaged on the floor, from the effect of the roots, and sometimes the shoots, occasioning the corn to lie hollow, here the 40 bushels of barley will shew as 80 bushels. Vide Ramsbottom, page 113, &c.

8In the northern part of England, the usual time of steeping barley in the cistern is about 80 hours.

40 bushels of barley wetted 1 hour, will guage then in the couch 40 bushels, that is, if drained from its exterior moisture.

Here the barley is supposed to be fully saturated with the water; and these 40 bushels of barley, guaged (after 80 hours wetting in the cistern) in the couch, will be 50 bushels; but when again guaged on the floor, from the effect of the roots, and sometimes the shoots, occasioning the corn to lie hollow, here the 40 bushels of barley will shew as 80 bushels. Vide Ramsbottom, page 113, &c.

9Boerhaave Elem. of Chym. Vol. I. p. 195-199. Exp. 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13.

10When the medium heat of the dryness of the malt, and of the heat of the extracts, are so high as to require the liquors to be forced or precipitated, in order to become pellucid, part of the oils which supported them sound, being carried down by the precipitant, they will be less capable of preserving themselves, after having been precipitated, than they were before.

11I chose this manner of expressing the quantity of moisture received in ground malt from the air, as it is the most easy for the direction of the first extract.

12Part I. Sect XII. p. 124.

13See page 56.

14For the properties answerable to the degrees, see page 124.

15It may be observed that, in the first and last degrees for drying malt, sometimes we say one degree more, sometimes a degree less.—The experiments we have made do not admit of a geometrical exactness, nor does the practice of brewing require it; small errors in beers are effectually removed by age, and these variations have often been adopted in the tables, for the conveniency of dividing into whole numbers.

16See p. 124.

17Purl, is pale ale, in which bitter aromatics, such as wormwood, orange peel, &c. are infused, used by the labouring people, chiefly in cold mornings, and a much better and wholesomer relief to them, than spiritous liquors.

18152, to which 2 degrees must be added, for what is lost in the extracts coming away, or 154 degrees, being the heat of the mash for keeping small beer, after amber; as this number is less than 166 degrees, the last mash of the amber, consequently, in the computation made, to find how much of the quantity of the liquor used, is to be made to boil, to give the true degree of heat to the mash of small, the difference of heat required in this mash, 154, and the heat of the goods 162 or 8, is to be multiplied by the volume of the goods, and the product in this case subtracted; whereas, in the operations for brewing, whose heat gradually increased every mash, it is to be added.

19We had rather attribute to this cause, the inferior quality of the Worcestershire hops, than to what is reported. That some planters in that county suffer their hops to be so ripe on the poles, that they become very brown before they are gathered: to recover their color, on the fire of the kiln they strew brimstone, which brings them to a fine yellow; the dryness and harshness this acid occasions, they correct by sprinkling the hops with milk, from whence they bag closer, and require little straining, but two ingredients more pernicious to the forming good beers, perhaps, could not have been thought of, than milk and brimstone.

20This rule only takes place for such climates as are of the same heat with ours; for when drinks are brewed to be expended in more southern countries, or to undergo long voyages, twenty pounds of hops to one quarter of malt have been used with success.

21If, of the whole quantity of hops grown in one year, one half is put into bags, whose tare is one tenth of their whole weight, and the other half is put in pockets, whose tare is one fortieth of their whole weight; if the excise office allows one tenth for tare upon the whole, and the excise or weighing officers, are content with one ninth, as by their marks, and the weight when sold to the brewer, appears to be the fact; then somewhat like one twentieth part more hops are grown, than what pays duty, or than the excise officers report to be the case.

22Forty shillings per hundred weight, are supposed to be the mean difference between new and old hops, and ought to be estimated in proportion to the quantity of old left in hand, and that of new hops grown, in order to ascertain the value of the last.

23B. stands for Barrels, F. for Firkins, G. for Gallons.

24When there are but two worts in brown strong, keeping strong, keeping pale small, or common small, the boiling is to be observed as marked for the second and third worts.

25The small cask, called apin, is one eighth part of a barrel.

26By new malt, I understand such, as has not lost the whole of the heat received on the kiln, and by old, such as is of equal heat with the air, or such which has laid a sufficient time to imbibe part of its moisture.

27At the time when the first edition of this work was published, porter or brown beers were brewed with very high dried malts; experience has shewn to the generality of the trade and to the author, this practice to be erroneous, the reasons why have before, and perhaps hereafter will again, be spoken of. In compliance with this improvement (though between the two proposed brewings, so great a variety will not appear) I have founded my calculations for porter, on malts dried so as best will answer this purpose.

28B. stands for barrels, F. for firkins, G. for gallons, and the numbers past the comma, where the inches are expressed, for decimals; 34 gallons are here allowed to the barrel, in compliance to the excise gauging, as these calculations were made without the bills.

29The half degree omitted in this mash will be added to the next.

30Different quantities of water are differently affected by the same portion of fire; when the ebullition is just over, and the surface of the liquor is become smooth; if some of it is, by a cock, drawn from the bottom of the copper, where the coldest water always is, the remaining part, having a greater proportion of fire than before, again begins to boil, though not affected by any increase of heat.

31See page 267.

32G. C. stands for great copper, L. C. stands for little copper.

33Deduction from the first mash for heat created by effervescence and hard corns. See the calculation above.

34Additions to the mashes on account of heat lost, by the liquor coming from little copper, and by mashing and standing. See page 293.

35The charge of the first liquor is for 11 barrels, with a deduction of 2 inches, according to the gauges of the coppers, page 221. These two inches answer to the 8 degrees of heat for the effervescence, hard corns, and new malt. See computation above.

36The second and following mashes are to be charged with as many more inches of boiling water, as answer to the fourth part of the number of degrees of heat lost by the refrigeration of the mashes. See page 294.

37In beers intended for long keeping, the fermentation is to be governed by the heat of the worts or musts, more than by that of the exterior air.

38A must or wort, when under fermentation, from its internal motion, increases in heat 10 degrees, and no keeping beers, when under this act, should exceed a heat of 60 degrees; for this reason, worts of this sort should at first be set to ferment at a heat of 50 degrees, and 50 degrees is nearly the mean of the heats these liquors are impressed with, when deposited in cellars, from the time of their being formed, to that of their coming into use. Their long continuance in this state is the reason why six pints of yeast per quarter of malt is a sufficient quantity to be used when the heat of the air is at or below 50 degrees. If, through necessity, processes of this sort are to be carried on when the mean heat of the natural day is more than this, the quantities indicated in the table will be the fittest rule.

39Though the air bubbles produced from malt liquors are more uniform, as to their size or consistence, than those of natural wines, yet they are not perfectly so; for this reason, and because it requires a greater power to cause a wort or must of malt to ferment, than it does to keep this act continued, after it is once begun, it is necessary, at first, to apply such a sufficient quantity of yeast as will obtain this purpose; therefore, one half of the remaining six gallons of yeast is put to the wort on its first coming down.

40The yeast or air bubbles produced from natural wines, vary not only in their consistence, but also in their volume; so that, in their act of fermentation, a progressive effect is the consequence of this want of uniformity. The yeast or air bubbles of barley wines are more uniform; to imitate nature, it is necessary to apply this principle of fermentation by degrees, to cause a progressive effect only. Feeding of drink is the only means to gain this end; thereby the newly applied yeast maintains the drink in its required agitation, in a similar manner as the increased heat and action raised by fermentation causes the air bubbles in natural wines to act and explode, in proportion to their consistence, and to the quantity of elastic air the bubbles contain; and so requisite it is periodically to apply more yeast to this sort of liquor, or regularly to feed it with this enlivening principle, that, in very hot weather, when this, through carelessness, has been omitted, I have known this ale to become foxed or putrefied, and could attribute this accident to no other cause but to a neglect of this sort, as the worts had been regularly brewed, laid thin in the coolers, received all the cold the night could give them, and the tun in which the drink was worked was perfectly clean.

41I confess this chapter is rather a matter of curiosity, an effusion of fancy, than of any use to me known; if I have suffered it to remain, it has been to shew that when we have long reflected upon a subject, our ideas often lead us beyond power of practice; and with this farther view, that, perhaps, it may become of service in the hands of some more ingenious and more penetrating artist than myself. However, if I trouble my reader with it, it may be said to be in imitation of an author far superior to myself in rank and knowledge.

42It must be observed, the wines of France in general make the best brandies, and of these, such which justly are termed green wines, (and soon would become acid) this leads us to the nature of the grain, and of the extractions to procure an equal, pure, nutty spirit. Barley, dried scarcely to the denomination of malt, and extracted with the lowest medium, or perhaps one inferior to this, most likely would answer this purpose. I have tried the experiment in a very imperfect manner, and found it answer beyond expectation.

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