Although the name of home-brew carries with it many old associations and sentiments which we abandon with regret—memories of bright March beer and mellow old October, of snug ingle-nooks and raftered ceilings, and of kind, if homely, welcome—we cannot but admit, as on a hot day we drain our tankard of Burton bitter, or of world-famed London stout, that life has still its compensations.
“To make barley-water was an invention which found out itself with little more than the joyning the ingredients together,” said old Fuller, in his _Worthies of England_; “but to make mault for drinke, was a master-piece indeed.” This old writer would seem to give the maltster more credit than the brewer. In his day, however, the distinction between the two was slight, for nearly every country gentleman or farmer was both his own brewer and his own maltster.
In 1610, the justices of Rutland, in settling the rate of domestic servants’ wages, adjudged that a chief woman, who could bake and brew _and make malt_, should have the sum of 24_s_. 8_d_. by the year; while a second best, who could brew but not malt, was to have 23_s_. 4_d_.
The earliest connected account of domestic malting and brewing which we have been able to find, occurs in a poetical work of the thirteenth century, called the _Treatise of Walter de Biblesworth_. The treatise deals with most matters of domestic concern and every-day life, and the passage in which the malting of barley and the brewing of ale are described, is so curious that it is given below in full length from the text to be found in _National Antiquities_, vol. i. (priv. pub. Th. Wright, Ed.).
“Seyoms ore entour cerveyse, Pur fere gens ben à eyse. Alumet, amy, cele lefrenole,[17] { 48} E kaunt averas manges de brakole, En une cuwe[18] large e leez, Cel orge là enfoundrez; E kaunt sera enfoundré, E le ewe seyt escouloé, Mountez cel haut soler, Si le festes nette baler,[19] E là cochet votre blée, Taunke seyt ben germée, De cele houre appelleras, Brès, ke blée avant nomas. Le brès de vostre mayn muez En mounceus ou en rengeés;[20] Pus le portez en un corbel, Pur ensechier au toral.[21] Le corbel e le corbiloun Vous serviront au fusoyn. Kaunt vostre brez est molu, E de ewe chaude ben enbeu, Des bertiz[22] ver cervoyse Par art contrové teise. Ky fet miracles e merveyles, De une chaundelie deus chandelis, De homme lay fet bon clerc, A homme desconu doune merk, Homme fort fet chatoner, { 49} E homme à roye haut juper,[23] Taunt de vertu de la grees De servoyse fet de brès, Ke la coyfe[24] de un bricoun Teyndre seet sanz vermilloun. Ceste matyre cy repose, Parlom ore de autre chose.”