The lemon acid of commerce is, as I have before said, a counterfeit; tartareous acid being employed as a cheap substitute for lemon or citric acid.
The soda-water on general sale is frequently contaminated with copper and lead, produced from the action of the carbonic acid contained in the water on the metallic substances of which the apparatus in which it is made is constructed.
The lozenges of all varieties, hues, flavours, and qualities, particularly those in the composition of which ginger, cream of tartar, magnesia, &c. are used, are sophisticated with a liberal portion of pipe-clay, as a cheap substitution for sugar; but this fraud is readily detected by laying one of the suspected lozenges on the pan of a fire shovel or sheet of iron made red-hot; when, if it be pure, it will readily take fire and be consumed, but if it be adulterated, it will burn feebly, and a hard strong substance will remain, resembling the lozenge in form.
It is well known that but little genuine honey can be obtained in London. The tests of good honey are its fragrance and sweetness. When it is suspected to be adulterated with starch or bean flour, the fraud may be discovered by dissolving the honey in cold water, when the flour will be readily seen, as it will not dissolve, but falls to the bottom of the vessel in powder. If honey thus adulterated be exposed to heat, it soon solidifies and becomes tenacious.
Honey is of three kinds; the first, called virgin honey, and which is of the finest flavour, is of a whitish cast, and in a fluid state, about the consistence of a syrup. The second is that known by the name of white honey, and its texture is almost solid. The third kind is the common yellow honey, obtained from the combs, by heating them over the fire, or by dipping them into hot water, and then pressing them.
Manna is sometimes counterfeited by a composition of sugar and honey, mixed with a small portion of scammony.
The adulteration of spermaceti is generally effected with wax; but the fraud may be detected by the smell of the adulterating ingredient, and by the dulness of the colour; whereas pure spermaceti is of a semitransparent crystalline appearance. It is also said that a preparation of the oil obtained from the tail of the whale is likewise vended for genuine spermaceti; but, as this factitious commodity assumes a yellow shade when exposed to the air, this imposition is also of easy detection.
The adulteration of the essential oils obtained from the more expensive spices is so common, that, as Mr. Accum says, “it is not easy to meet with any that are fit for use,” and so much subtle ingenuity is made use of in the sophistications, that no known tests or agents exist for the detection of the fraud. The only certain tests are the taste or flavour, and the smell.
It is worth while to attend to the plausible excuses of the respective “artists” of these sophistications. They allege that they are obliged to have recourse to the fraud, to meet the fancies “of those clever persons in their own conceit who are fond of haggling, and insist on buying better bargains than other people, shutting their eyes to the defects of an article, so that they can enjoy the delight of getting it cheap; and secondly, for those persons, who being but bad paymasters, yet as the manufacturer, for his own credit-sake, cannot charge more than the usual price of the articles, he thinks himself therefore authorized to adulterate it in value, to make up for the risk he runs, and the long credit he gives;”—they therefore are reduced to the necessity of keeping, as they term it, “reduced articles,” and genuine ones. This is excellent logic, and no doubt well understood by the whole sophisticating tribe. The public are indebted to Dr. T. Lloyd for this information, which he communicated to the Literary Gazette, No. 146.
The ready methods or tests for ascertaining the good qualities of the most common drugs are: