Beverage

“ He whose mind is occupied throughout the hours of business with, say, the complicated and scientific operation of brewing, who knows the strange rich alchemy by which a beverage still called (out of respect for antiquity) by the name of beer is extracted from glucose, sulphuric acid, arsenic, and many other chemicals, such a man will be little inclined to waste his leisure in perusing idle fantasies. ”

“ It was just so in the American Revolution, in 1776, the first delicacy the men threw overboard in Boston harbor was the tea, woman's favorite beverage. The tobacco and whiskey, though heavily taxed, they clung to with the tenacity of the devil-fish. ”

“ Beer, in its perfect condition, is an excellent and healthful beverage, combining, in some measure, the virtues of water, of wine, and of food, as it quenches thirst, stimulates, cheers, and strengthens. The vinous portion of it is the alcohol, proceeding from the fermentation of the malt sugar. Its amount, in common strong ale or beer, is about 4 per cent., or four measures of spirits, specific gravity 0·825 in 100 measures of the liquor. The best brown stout porter contains 6 per cent., the strongest ale even 8 per cent.; but common beer only one. ”

“ The porter and stout of the metropolis have long been famous. The virtues of the latter drink are celebrated all over the world; and a royal duke, ascribed the great [Pg 83] mortality among the guards in the East to the want of their favourite beverage. No doubt the pure liquor, as it comes from the great brewers, is wholesome and strengthening; but it no sooner gets into the possession of the publicans than, in a great majority of cases, the article is made up. ”

“ Unless 'liquors' is given a meaning broad enough to include beer, it is superfluous, for 'wines, cordials, and distilled spirits' are ample to cover all intoxicating beverages other than malt liquors, such as ale and beer. ”

“ And even milk hath flavour, too,
When sun-kissed milkmaids hand it you.
Beer, in a large resounding can
Befits a coarser type of man,
While some rejoice in spirit pure,
And others in a faked liqueur. ”

“ Liquor Consumption.—Too much importance is often attached to actual statistics of the consumption of liquor as an evidence of the success or failure of local option, and of restriction or prohibition of manufacture and sale. They are by no means conclusive, and especially have slight bearing on the important question, involved in most local option and prohibition enactments, concerning the nature, character and number of saloons and places where intoxicating beverages are sold and consumed. ”

“ Alcohol has become a substance of such prime necessity in the arts and manufactures, and in one form or another enter so largely into the composition of the common beverages consumed by all classes of people that its manufacture must, of necessity, rank among the most important industries of this and other lands. ”

“ Take a filled ale-jug, or the well-known 'pewter' of a tavern or public-house, and pour out gently into a glass: scarcely any froth is produced. Pour out the self-same liquor from the self-same vessel in a stream several inches high, and you produce a foaming 'head,' which to the eye seems to be a substance quite different from ale or beer. Open a bottle of lemonade or ginger-beer, of soda-water{448} or seltzer-water, and pour out the contents into a glass; the formation of froth is so rapid and abundant that the glass appears full when it really contains but a small quantity of liquid. ”

“ To T. M. W.
(Air: Drink to me only.)
Drink to me only with thine eyes and I'll pledge thee with mine,
Leave but some coffee in thy cup and I'll not ask for wine.
A circuit dinner, as I know, doth ask a drink divine,
Yet would I scorn the mess champagne, could I get but that liquor of thine. ”

“ There were three of us—a soldier, a flâneur and myself, who am neither but would like to be either. We were talking about the strange appearance—a phenomenon of the day—of French wine in German bottles, and this led to the re-expression of my life-long surprise that bottles should exist in such numbers as they do—bottles everywhere, all over the world, with wine and beer in them, and no one under any obligation to save and return them. ”

“ The immense variety of drinking-cups, as well as the intrinsic value of many of them, speaks volumes. He describes them as ‘some of elme, some of box, some of maple, some of holly, &c., mazers, broad-mouth’d dishes, moggins, whiskins, piggins, cruizes, ale-bowles, wassell-bowles, court-dishes, tankards, kannes, from a bottle to a pint, from a pint to a gill. Other bottles we have of leather, but they are most used amongst the shepheards and harvest-people of the countrey ”

“ There’s never a tradesman in England, that can my ale deny, The weaver, taylor and glover delights it for to buy, Small money they do take away, if that they drink with me, For my ale was tunn’d when I was young, and a little above my knee. ”

“ You take the cool cup thankfully and swallow it down at one long draught; fresh as a May morning, pure as an English hill-side spring, delicate as—well, as cocoa-nut water. None but itself can be its parallel. It is certainly the most delicious, dainty, transparent, crystal drink ever invented. ”

“ Keeping Beer.—You should not let beer stand in a pot or jug; but, if there be any left, put it into a clean bottle, with a tea-spoonful of sugar, and cork it tightly.
987. Never suffer two things to be put together, which would give to each other a disagreeable taste or flavor. Never cut [259] bread, or butter, or meat, with a knife which has been used for cheese or onions, or the bread, butter, or meat will taste of them. ”

“ The cool air sobered me, and my friend congratulated me on my recovery from a state of inebriety.
"After a little practice at the bar," said he—"it will take a good many tods to floor you. Let me give you a few hints as regards drinking. Never mix your liquor—always stick to one kind. After every glass, eat a cracker—or, what is better, a pickle. Plain drinks are always the best—far preferable to fancy drinks, which contain sugar, and lemons, and mint, and other trash; although a mixed drink may be taken on a stormy night, such as this has been. ”

“ Chemistry seems to agree with the temperance society, that wine, beer, brandy, gin, whiskey, and rum are alcohol and water, mixed in different proportions, and with some slight differences of flavoring and coloring matter. In all these drinks, teetotalers maintain, alcohol is power, the other ingredients being mere dilution and flavoring. Wine, they assure us, is alcohol and water flavored with grapes; beer is alcohol and water flavored with malt and hops; Bourbon whiskey is alcohol and water flavored with corn. ”

“ The ways of our lords were ever riddling and obscure. To the right a celestial bottle, stretching from the horizon to the zenith, appears, is uncorked, and scatters the worlds with the foam of what ambrosial liquor may have been within. ”

“ Now I need not tell any gentleman or lady with common understanding, that if he or she was to drink an honest bottle of whiskey at one pull, it is not at all the same thing as drinking a bottle of water; and in the whole course of my life, I never knew more than five men who could do so without being overtaken by the liquor. ”

“ Beer is seldom at the public-house what it was at the brewery. A late partner in one of the metropolitan breweries says:—‘It is quite notorious if you drink beer at the brewery, and at a public-house a little way off, you find it a very different commodity’ (4538) .
4. The drinks are adulterated, as well as diluted. Mr. Ridley, who has under his management certain offices for the analysation of alcoholic liquors, states that there are several recipes, such as [Pg 362] ‘To a barrel of porter [add] 12 gallons of liquor, 4 lbs. ”

“ Their pockets are distended with bottles of spirits: they drink, wiping the necks of the bottles with hardened palms ... the liquor sends a livid flush, a purple veil of heat, over faces seared and pitted with poverty. ”

“ A rough, lumbering, insensible navvy may drink a quart or two of tea, or a few gallons of beer, or several quarterns of gin, with but small results of any kind. I know an omnibus-driver who makes seven double journeys daily, and his ‘reglars’ are half a quartern of gin at each terminus—i.e. 13⁄4 pints daily, exclusive of extras. This would render most men helplessly drunk, but he is never drunk, and drives well and safely. ”

“ The fresh air and the long road have set our teeth on edge and given us an appetite. We halt to break a crust. Some have brought canteens of wine or coffee; bottles of preserves appear, and the improvident—I am one—pay homage to those who pass a full flask. ”

“ Hence it is evident that water in general is the best and most wholesome drink; but as some constitutions require something to warm and stimulate the stomach, fermented liquors may be proper, if taken in moderation. It is necessary however, that beer, ale, cider, and wine, be taken in a sound state and of proper age, or they will be highly detrimental. Spirituous liquors, taken too freely, or in a raw state, are attended with direful effects, and are the destruction of thousands. ”

“ I come now to a most important part of your economy, the bottling of a hogshead of wine, wherein I recommend three virtues, cleanliness, frugality, and brotherly love. Let your corks be of the longest kind you can get; which will save some wine in the neck of every bottle: as to your bottles, choose the smallest you can find, which will increase the number of dozens, and please your master; for a bottle of wine is always a bottle of wine whether it hold more or less; and if your master has his proper number of dozens, he cannot complain. ”

“ Mills is of opinion, that small beer should always be brewed by itself; in which case, two bushels and a half of malt, and a pound and a half of hops, are sufficient to make a hogshead.
4. Of the Vessels used in Brewing. The brew-bouse ibelf, and every vessel in it, ought to be perfectly clean and sweet; for if the vessels are in the least degree tainted, the liquor put into them will contract a disagreeable scent and taste. A vessel of the most simple and excellent contrivance, among the multiplicity of brewing utensils adapted to family purposes, is that of Mr. ”

“ A fermented liquor, for example, which is called beer, but which, as it is made of molasses, bears very little resemblance to our beer, makes a considerable part of the common drink of the people in America. ”

“ American women of the fast sets drink at the clubs; an insidious drink—the "high-ball"—is a common one, yet I never saw a woman under the influence of wine or liquor. The amount of both consumed in America, is amazing. The consumption per head in the United States for beer alone is ten and a half gallons for each of the eighty millions. ”

“ That no merchant, vintner, wine-cooper or other person, selling or retailing any wine, shall mingle or utter any Spanish wine mingled with any French wine, or Rhenish wine, cyder, perry, stummed wine, honey, sugar, syrups of sugar, molasses, or any other syrups whatsoever: nor put in any isinglass, brimstone, lime, raisins, juice of raisins, water, nor any other liquor nor ingredients, [Pg 236] nor any clary or other herbs, nor any sort of flesh whatsoever.
The excise duties on superior beer was 1s. 3d.; on inferior, 3d.; on a hogshead of cider or perry, 1s. 3d.; on a gallon of mead, 1⁄2d. ”

“ On the passenger trains, ice, soda water, ginger ale, beer and other soft drinks are carried by an agent of the eating-house contractor, who furnishes them for 8 cents a bottle, and it pays him to do so, for an enormous quantity is consumed during the hot weather. ”

“ The adults of England, he said, in his famous wine speech, drink, on an average, three hundred quarts of beer each per annum! Now, it is physically impossible for a human brain, muddled every day with a quart of beer, to correctly hold correct opinions, or appropriate pure knowledge. ”

“ For a stronger beer, 36 lbs., or even 1⁄2 cwt., of treacle, may be used. It will then keep good for a twelvemonth.
Obs. A wholesome drink; but one apt to prove laxative when taken in large quantities. See Brewing, Beer, Ginger, Powders, &c.
BEERS. (In pharmacy.) Syn. Cerevis′iæ (-vĭzh′-e-ē) medica′tæ, L. The general nature and preparation of these articles have been already noticed. [127] They are little employed in this country. The ingredients should be so proportioned that from 1⁄4 to 1⁄2 a pint may form the proper dose. ”

“ The little tables were spread tinder the trees, and then, later on, perhaps, the customers were spread under the tables.—I would ask you to recall the manly seidel of dark beer as you knew it, the bitter chill of it as it went down, the simple felicity it induced in the care-burdened mind. I could quote to you poet after poet who has nourished his song upon honest malt liquor. ”

“ The rapidity and dexterity with which they mix half-a-dozen different kinds of drinks all at once is perfectly wonderful; one sees nothing but a confusion of bottles and tumblers and cascades of fluids as he pours them from glass to glass at arm’s length for the better amalgamation of the ingredients; and in the time it would take an ordinary man to pour out a glass of wine, the mixtures are ready, each prepared as accurately as an apothecary makes up a prescription. ”

“ Wine alone loosens my tongue, friend Bull, and I am not one of those men who loves to drink by himself. You are too proud to empty a cup with your master. Sleep well till to-morrow, the day of the auction. ”

“ Fifty years ago, in this country, in England, and on the continent of Europe, farm laborers and servants living in the house, expected so many pints or quarts of ale or beer a day, as part of their regular food rations, just as they now would expect milk or tea or coffee. ”

“ By the Excise laws at present existing in this country, the various degrees of strength of brandy, rum, arrack, gin, whiskey, and other spiritous liquors, chiefly composed of little else than spirit of wine, are determined by the quantity of alcohol of a given specific gravity contained in the spiritous liquors of a supposed unknown strength. ”