_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 52,75 Ditto, Bourdeaux, ditto ditto 54,50 Ditto, Cette 53,00 Ditto, Naples, average of 3 samples 53,25 Ditto, Spanish average of 6 samples 52,28 Rum 53,68 Ditto, Leeward, average of 9 samples 53,00 Scotch Whiskey, average of 6 samples 53,50 Irish Ditto, average of 4 samples 54,25 Arrack, Batavia 49,50 Dutch Geneva 52,25 Gin (Hodges's,[102]) 3 samples, procured from retail dealers 48,25 Ditto (Ditto,)[102] procured from the manufacturer 52,35
[88] George III. c. xxviii. May 1818--"An Act for establishing the use of Sikes's hydrometer in ascertaining the strength of spirit, instead of Clark's hydrometer."
[89] Sixteen and a half per cent. proof, according to Sikes's hydrometer.
[92] Observations on Malted and Unmalted Corn, connected with Brewing and Distilling, p. 167; and Shannon on Brewing and Distilling, p. 232, 233.
[94] This operation forms part of the business of the so-called brewers' druggists. It forms the article in their Price Currents, called _Spirit Flavour_.
Wine lees are imported in this country for that purpose: they pay the same duty as foreign wines.
[95] Observations on Malted and Unmalted Corn, connected with Brewing and Distilling, p. 167.
[96] Apicius Redivivus, 2d edition, p. 480.
[99] Shannon on Brewing and Distilling, p. 198.
[101] Repository of Arts, p. 350, Dec. 1819.
Several instances have come under my notice in which Gloucester cheese has been contaminated with red lead, and has produced serious consequences on being taken into the stomach. In one poisonous sample which it fell to my lot to investigate, the evil had been caused by the sophistication of the anotta, employed for colouring cheese. This substance was found to contain a portion of red lead; a method of sophistication 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 of food may be unconsciously diffused, and of the consequent difficulty of detecting the real fabricators of them, it may not be uninteresting to relate to your readers, the various steps by which the fraud of a poisonous adulteration of cheese was traced to its source.