Here—as ’tis said—in days of yore, (Such days, alas! will come no more), Resided Sir John Barleycorn, An ancient Briton, nobly born, With Mrs. Hop—a well-met pair, For he was rich, and she was fair.
Yet they—like other married Folke, When their past vows they can’t revoke— Were opposite in disposition, And quarrell’d without intermission; For He alone produc’d the Sweets, Which She, with Bitters only, meets! {372}
Howe’er by dint of perseverance, By gentle conjugal endearance, The Sweets predominating most, In strength excelling, rul’d the roast; Whilst she, obedient, did her duty— That greatest ornament of beauty.
Her Bitters, thus by him controll’d, Their wholesome properties unfold, And give to him superior pow’rs— Superior charms for social hours; As Beauty, with persuasive tongue, Tempers the mind, by passion wrung.
At length, from this domestic Pair, Was born a well-known Son and Heir; Whose deeds o’er half the world are fam’d, By Britons, Master Porter, nam’d.
Meux’s great vat then contained about 3,555 barrels, and was 22 ft. high. In October, 1814, owing to the defective state of its hoops, it burst, and the results were most disastrous. The brewery in the Tottenham Court Road was at that time hemmed in by miserable tenements, which were crowded by people of the poorer classes. Some of these houses were simply flooded with porter, two or three collapsed, and no less than eight persons met their death, either in the ruins or from drowning, the fumes of the porter, or by drunkenness. At the inquest the jury returned the verdict: “Death by Casualty.” Seven huge vats—the largest holding 15,000 barrels—now take the place of the one that burst. The Times of April 1, 1785, says, “There is a cask now building at Messrs. Meux & Co.’s brewery in Liquorpond Street, Gray’s Inn Lane, the size of which exceeds all credibility, being designed to hold 20,000 barrels of porter; the whole expense attending the same will be upwards of £10,000.” About this time the London porter brewers vied with each other in building large vats, a practice they have now discontinued.
It would be difficult to imagine a liquor more suitable for the working classes than good porter—taken in moderation, of course. Not only does it afford the slight stimulant which, in another place, we have shown to be beneficial to the human body, but it also contains much {373} nutritive matter, both organic and inorganic, together with saccharine. The old writer who spoke of ale as being meat, drink, and clothing probably had no highly scientific knowledge of the chemical properties of the liquor he was extolling, but the statement—based, no doubt, on experience—can be called an exaggerated one.
Very satisfactory is it to know that in Ireland porter is steadily displacing whisky. Even in the western portions of the island, the younger generation—excepting, perhaps, on holidays, at fairs, and on other festive occasions—are taking most kindly to their “porther.” It will be a happy thing for that country when “porther” shall have altogether displaced poteen. The whisky sold at threepence for each small wine-glassful in most of the country spirit shops in Ireland, and always taken neat by the natives, is of a most injurious character, being new, and consequently containing much fusel oil. Far be it from us to say a word against good, well-matured whisky, which, taken in moderation, is a most wholesome drink; but, good or bad, it is not the drink for working men who require a more sustaining and less expensive liquor. What have the total abstainers to suggest? Water, the diffuser of epidemics, and hardly ever obtained pure by the labouring classes; tea, which is almost as injurious as spirits to the nervous system, which lacks nutritive properties, and which is by no means an inexpensive liquor; coffee and cocoa, both hot drinks and most unsuitable to slake the thirst of a labouring man; various effervescing drinks, all more or less injurious to the digestive organs, when taken habitually, and of whose composition no man hath knowledge, save the makers, and temperance wines, certain vendors of which were not long back prosecuted for attempting to defraud the revenue, when this abstainer’s tipple was found to contain some twenty per cent. of alcohol. One liquor, alone, have the teetotal party invented, which is nourishing, inexpensive, and wholesome. This we may term oatmeal mash, or cold comfort. It consists of scalded oatmeal, water, and some flavouring matter. For harvesters working in the almost tropical heat of an August sun, this is, no doubt, a wholesome drink, but it can hardly be called palatable. As a matter of fact, no non-alcoholic substitute has been put forward by the teetotal party which is in the least likely to take the place of porter; and until such beverage is invented—an event which we feel perfectly certain will never come to pass—the porter and stout brewers of the United Kingdom will have every opportunity of continuing to confer on the working classes the benefits of cheap and wholesome liquor. {374}
One temperance drink we had almost overlooked—herb-beer. In the House of Commons, on May 6, 1886, Mr. Fletcher asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer why the Excise officers had interfered with the sale of herb-beer, a non-intoxicating beverage. To this the Chancellor of the Exchequer replied, that the Inland Revenue did not interfere with any liquors which contained less than three degrees of proof spirit, though legally no beer could be brewed under the name of herb-beer which had more than two degrees of alcohol. Some of these non-intoxicating liquors, sold as temperance drinks, had been found to be of considerably greater strength than London porter. For the protection of the revenue it was necessary—and so on. Comment is needless.