In London, the sophistication of wine is carried to an enormous extent, as well as the art of manufacturing spurious wine, which has become a regular trade, in which a large capital is invested; and it is well known that many thousand pipes of spoiled cider are annually sent to the metropolis for the purpose of being converted into an imitation of port wine.
Innumerable are the tricks practised to deceive the unwary, by giving to weak, thin, and spoiled wines, all the characteristic marks of age, and also of flavour and strength. In carrying on these illicit occupations, the division of labour has been completely established; each has his own task assigned him in the confederate work of iniquity; and thus they acquire dexterity for the execution of their mischievous purposes. To one class is allotted the task of crusting, which consists in lining the interior surface of empty wine bottles with a red crust. This is accomplished by suffering a saturated hot solution of super-tartrate of potash, coloured red with a decoction of Brazil wood to chrystallize within them. A similar operation is frequently performed on the wooden cask which is to hold the wine, and which, in the same manner as the bottle, is artificially stained with a red crust; and on some occasions, the lower extremities of the corks in wine bottles are also stained red, in order to give them the appearance of having been long in contact with the wine. It is the business of a particular class of wine-coopers, by means of an astringent extract mixed with home-made and foreign wines, to produce ‘genuine old port,’ or to give an artificial flavour and colour to weak wine; while the mellowing and restoring of spoiled white wines is the occupation of another class called refiners of wine. Other deceptions are practised by fraudulent dealers, which are still more culpable. The most dangerous of these is where wine is adulterated by an admixture of lead.
Mr. Accum justly observes, that the ‘merchant or dealer who practises this dangerous sophistication, adds the crime of murder to that of fraud, and deliberately scatters the seeds of disease and death among those customers who contribute to his emolument.’
Spirituous liquors, which in this country form one of the chief articles of consumption, are subjects of equally extensive fraud with wine. The deceptions which are practised by the dealers in this article, are chiefly confined to fraudulent imitations of the peculiar flavour of different sorts of spirits; and as this flavour constitutes, along with the strength, the value of the spirit, the profit of the dealer consists in imitating this quality at a cheaper rate than it is produced in the genuine spirit. The flavour of French brandy is imitated, by distilling British molasses spirit over wine lees; previous to which, however, the spirit is deprived of its peculiar disagreeable flavour, by rectification over fresh-burnt charcoal and quicklime. This operation is performed by those who are called brewers’ druggists, and forms the article in the prices-current called Spirit Flavour. Wine lees are imported into this country for the purpose, and they pay the same duty as foreign wines. Another method of imitating the flavour of brandy, which is adopted by brandy merchants, is by means of a spirit obtained from raisin wine, after it has begun to become somewhat sour. ‘Oak sawdust,’ (Mr. Accum observes), ‘and a spirituous tincture of raisin stones, are likewise used to impart to new brandy and rum a ripe taste, resembling brandy or rum long kept in oaken casks, and a somewhat oily consistence, so as to form a durable froth at its surface, when strongly agitated in a vial. The colouring substances are burnt sugar, or molasses; the latter gives to imitative brandy a luscious taste, and fulness in the mouth.’ Gin, which is sold in small quantities to those who judge of the strength by the taste, is made up for sale by fraudulent dealers with water and sugar; and this admixture rendering the liquor turbid, several expedients are resorted to, in order to clarify it; some of which are harmless, while others are criminal. A mixture of alum with subcarbonate of potash, is sometimes employed for this purpose; but more frequently, in place of this, a solution of subacetate of lead, and then a solution of alum,—a practice reprobated by Mr. Accum as highly dangerous, owing to the admixture of the lead with the spirit, which thereby becomes poisonous. After this operation, it is usual to give a false appearance of strength to the spirit by mixing with it grains of paradise, guinea pepper, capsicum, and other acrid and aromatic substances.
In the manufacture of malt liquors, a wide field is opened for the operations of fraud. The immense quantity of the article consumed, presents an irresistible temptation to the unprincipled dealer; while the vegetable substances with which beer is adulterated, are in all cases difficult to be detected, and are frequently beyond the reach of chemical analysis. There is, accordingly, no article which is the subject of such varied and extensive frauds. These are committed in the first instance by the brewer, during the process of manufacture, and afterwards by the dealer, who deteriorates, by fraudulent intermixtures, the liquor which he sells to the consumer. ‘The intoxicating qualities of porter (he continues) are to be ascribed to the various drugs intermixed with it;’ and, as some sorts of porter are more heady than others, the difference arises, according to this author, ‘from the greater or less quantity of stupifying ingredients’ contained in it. These consist of various substances, some of which are highly deleterious. Thus, the extract disguised under the name of black extract, and ostensibly destined for the use of tanners and dyers, is obtained by boiling the berries of the cocculus indicus in water, and converting, by a subsequent evaporation, this decoction into a stiff black tenacious mass, possessing in a high degree the narcotic and intoxicating quality of the poisonous berry from which it is prepared. Quassia is another substance employed in place of hops, to give the beer a bitter taste; and the shavings of this wood are sold in a half torrified and ground state, in order to prevent its being recognised.
Not only is the use of all these deleterious substances strictly prohibited to the brewer under severe penalties, but all druggists or grocers convicted of supplying him with any of them, or who have them in their possession, are liable to severe penalties; and Mr. Accum gives a list of twenty-nine convictions for this offence, from the year 1812 to 1819. From the year 1813 to 1819, the number of brewers prosecuted and convicted of using illegal ingredients in their breweries, amounts to thirty-four. Numerous seizures have also been made during the same period at various breweries, and in the warehouses of brewers’-druggists, of illegal ingredients, to be used in the brewing of beer, some of them highly deleterious.
Malt liquors, after they are delivered by the brewer to the retail-dealer, are still destined to undergo various mutations before they reach the consumer. It is a common practice with the retailers of beer, though it be contrary to law, to mix table-beer with strong beer; and, to disguise this fraud, recourse is had to various expedients. It is a well known property of genuine beer, that when poured from one vessel into another, it bears a strong white froth, without which professed judges would not pronounce the liquor good. This property is lost, however, when table-beer is mixed with strong beer; and to restore it, a mixture of what is called beer-heading is added, composed of common green vitriol, alum, and salt. To give a pungent taste to weak insipid beer, capsicum and grains of paradise, two highly acrid substances, are employed; and, of date, a concentrated tincture of these articles has appeared for sale in the prices-current of brewers’-druggists. To bring beer forward, as it is technically called, or to make it hard, a portion of sulphuric acid is mixed with it, which, in an instant, produces an imitation of the age of eighteen months; and stale, half-spoiled, or sour beer, is converted into mild beer, by the simple admixture of an alkali or an alkaline earth; oyster-shell powder, and subcarbonate of potash, or soda, being usually employed for that purpose. In order to show that these deceptions are not imaginary, Mr. Accum refers to the frequent convictions of brewers for those fraudulent practices, and to the seizures which have been made at different breweries of illegal ingredients—a list of which, and of the proprietors of the breweries where they were seized, he has extracted from the Minutes of the Committee of the House of Commons, appointed to Inquire into the Price and Quality of Beer. It may be observed, that while some of the sophistications of beer appear to be perfectly harmless, other substances are frequently employed for this purpose which are highly deleterious, and which must gradually undermine the health of those by whom they are used.
Many other of the most ordinary articles of consumption are mentioned by our author as being the object of the most disgusting and pernicious frauds. Tea, it is well known, from the numerous convictions which have lately taken place, has been counterfeited to an enormous extent; and copper, in one form or another, is the chief ingredient made use of for effecting the imitation.
The practice of adulterating coffee, has also been carried on for a long time, and to a considerable extent, while black and white pepper, Cayenne pepper, mustard, pickles of all sorts, have been all of them debased by an admixture of baser, and, in many cases, poisonous ingredients. Ground pepper is frequently sophisticated by an admixture from the sweepings of the pepper warehouses. These sweepings are purchased in the market under the initials P. D., signifying pepper dust. ‘An inferior sort of this vile refuse (Mr. Accum observes), or the sweepings of P. D., is distinguished among venders by the abbreviation of D. P. D., denoting dust, or dirt of pepper dust.’
Of those various frauds so ably exposed in Mr. Accum’s work, and which are so much the more dangerous, as they are committed under the disguise of an honourable trade, it is impossible to speak in terms of too strong reprobation; and in the first impulse of our indignation, we were inclined to avenge such iniquitous practices by some signal punishment. We naturally reflect, that such offences, in whatever light they are viewed, are of a far deeper dye than many of those for which our sanguinary code awards the penalty of death—and we wonder that the punishment hitherto inflicted, has been limited to a fine. If we turn our view, however, from the moral turpitude of the act, to a calm consideration of that important question, namely,—What is the most effectual method of protecting the community from those frauds?—we will then see strong reasons for preferring the lighter punishment. We do not find from experience, that offences are prevented by severe punishments. On the contrary, the crime of forgery, under the most unrelenting execution of the severe law against it, has grown more frequent. As those, therefore, by whom the offence of adulterating articles of provision is committed, are generally creditable and wealthy individuals, the infliction of a heavy fine, accompanied by public disgrace, seems a very suitable punishment: and if it be duly and reasonably applied, there is little doubt that it will be found effectual to check, and finally to root out, those disgraceful frauds.