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17. Economical Application of Yeast.
It frequently happens, in the summer season, that the brewers, in
order to render their beer less liable to spoil, use more hops than
usual; the consequence of which is, that the yeast becomes very
bitter, and gives a disagreeable flavour to the bread. To obviate this
inconvenience, Mr. Stone has recommended the following method of
raising a bushel of flour with only a tea-spoonful of yeast.
Suppose a bushel of flour be put it into the kneading trough, then
take about three quarters of a pint of warm water, and one tea-
spoonful of yeast. Stir it in till it is thoroughly mixed with the water;
and make a hole in the middle of the flour, large enough to contain
two gallons of water. Pour in the yeast and add some of the flour
until it is a thick liquid paste; strew some of the dry flour over it, and
let it stand an hour. Then take a quart more of warm water, and
pour it in: in about an hour it will be seen that the small quantity of
yeast has raised the mixture so, that it will break through the dry
flour placed over it; and when the warm water has been added, take
a stick and stir in more flour until it is as thick as before; then shake
again some dry flour over it, and leave it for two hours more, the
mass will rise and break through the dry flour again; you may then
add three quarts or a gallon of water, and stir in the flour, and make
it into a soft paste, taking care to cover it with dry flour again, and
in about three or four hours more the dough may be mixed up, and
covered up warm; and in four or five hours more it may be made up
into loaves, and put in the oven; and in this manner may be
produced as light a bread as though a pint of yeast had been used.
It does not take above a quarter of an hour more than the usual way
of baking, for there is no time lost but that of adding the water at
three or four times. The author of this method assures us that he
constantly bakes in this way. In the morning, about six or seven
o’clock, he puts the flour in the trough, and mixes up the spoonful of
yeast with the warm water; in an hour’s time he adds more flour, in
18. two hours, again more, and about noon makes up the dough, and
about six in the evening it is put into the oven: he has always good
bread.
19. Economical Preparation of Yeast.
The following economical method of making yeast is
recommended by Dr. Lettsom.
Thicken two quarts of water with four ounces of fine flour, boil it
for half an hour, then sweeten it with three ounces of brown sugar;
when almost cold, pour it with four spoonfuls of baker’s yeast into
an earthen jug, deep enough for the fermentation to go on without
running over; place it for a day near the fire, then pour off the thin
liquor from the top, shake the remainder, and close it up for use,
first straining it through a sieve. To preserve it sweet, set it in a cool
cellar, or hang it some depth in a well. Keep always some of this to
make the next quantity of yeast that is wanted. Mr. I. Kerby
recommends the following method of obtaining yeast from potatoes.
20. Potatoe Yeast.
Boil potatoes of the mealy sort, till they are thoroughly soft, skin
and mash them very smooth, and put as much hot water on them as
will make a mash of the consistency of common beer yeast, but not
thicker. Add to every pound of potatoes, two ounces of treacle, and
when just warm, stir in for every pound of potatoes, two large
spoonfuls of yeast. Keep it warm till it has done fermenting, and in
twenty-four hours it will be fit for use. A pound of potatoes will make
near a quart of yeast, which has been found to answer the purpose
so well, as not to be able to distinguish the bread made with it, from
bread made with brewer’s yeast.
21. Method of Preserving Yeast.
When yeast is plentiful, take a quantity and work it well with a
whisk until it becomes thin; then procure a large wooden dish or
platter, clean and dry, and with a soft brush lay a thin layer of yeast
on the dish, and turn the top downwards to keep out the dust, but
not the air, which is to dry it. When the first coat is dry, lay on
another, and let that dry, and so continue till the quantity is
sufficient; by this means it may soon be made two or three inches
thick, when it may be preserved in dry tin canisters or stopped
bottles, for a long time, good. When used for baking, cut a piece off
and dissolve it in warm water, when it will be fit for use.
FINIS.
C. GREEN, LEICESTER STREET,
LEICESTER SQUARE.
22. NOTICE.
The Public are respectfully informed, that a new Edition,
considerably enlarged (price 9s.), has lately been published,
OF
ACCUM’S
Treatise on Adulterations of Food,
AND CULINARY POISONS;
Exhibiting the fraudulent Sophistications of Bread, Beer, Wine,
Spirituous Liquors, Tea, Coffee, Cream, Confectionary,
Vinegar, Mustard, Pepper, Cheese, Olive Oil,
Pickles, and other Articles employed in
Domestic Economy; and Method
of detecting them.
(Copied from the British Review, No. XXIX. p. 171.)
Mr. Accum seems determined that even the outside of his book
shall awaken our fears. The cover of our copy bears a death’s head
emblazoned upon a pall, and, underneath, the motto “there is death
in the pot.” The pall is supported by the point of a dart. Four other
darts support the four corners of the device. Twelve serpents, with
forked tongues and tails entwined, form a terrific wreath around;
while the middle is occupied with a large cobweb, delineated with
much attention to detail, in the centre of which a spider, full as large
as a moderate sized hazel nut, and so frightful that more than one
young lady of our acquaintance would think it necessary to scream
at the sight of it, holds in its envenomed fangs an ill-fated fly, which
23. is sinking under the loss of blood, and buzzing in the agonies of
death.
We are by no means desirous to raise or maintain a popular
clamour; but Mr. Accum certainly advances some weighty charges,
and his work comes with an advantage in bearing a name not
unknown to the scientific world. Of the adulterations specified, some
are deleterious, and others merely fraudulent. Accordingly, we shall
offer a few extracts, both from the original matter of Mr. Accum, and
from his citations drawn from previous authors.
“Among the number of substances used in domestic economy which
are now very generally found sophisticated, may be distinguished,—tea,
coffee, bread, beer, wine, spirituous liquors, salad oil, pepper, vinegar,
mustard, cream, and other articles of subsistence. Indeed it would be
difficult to mention a single article of food which is not to be met with in
an adulterated state. And there are some substances which are scarcely
ever to be procured genuine.” (P. 3.)
But we pass on from the general statements at the beginning of
the work to particulars.
Water, by standing in leaden reservoirs, acquires a highly
deleterious property.
In some particular cases, the consequences have been most fatal.
“‘A gentleman was the father of a numerous offspring, having had one
and twenty children, of whom eight died young, and thirteen survived
their parents. During their infancy, and indeed until they had quitted the
place of their usual residence, they were all remarkably unhealthy, being
particularly subject to disorders of the stomach and bowels. The father,
during many years, was paralytic; the mother, for a long time was subject
to cholics and bilious obstructions.’” (P. 78, 79.)
These effects were traced to a leaden pump, in the cylinder of
which there were found several perforations, while the cistern “was
reduced to the thinness of common brown paper, and was full of
holes like a sieve.” (P. 79.)
We now come to the adulteration of wine; to many of our readers,
probably, a far more interesting concern than that of water.
24. “All persons moderately conversant with the subject are aware, that a
portion of alum is added to young and meagre red wines, for the purpose
of brightening the colour; that Brazil-wood, or the husks of elderberries
and bilberries, are employed to impart a deep rich purple tint to red port
of a pale, feint colour; that gypsom is used to render cloudy white wines
transparent; that an additional astringency is imparted to immature red
wines by means of oak-wood sawdust, and the husks of filberts, and that
a mixture of spoiled foreign and home-made wines is converted into the
wretched compound frequently sold in this town by the name of genuine
old Port.... A nutty flavour is produced by bitter almonds; fictitious Port
wine is flavoured with a tincture drawn from the seeds of raisins, and the
ingredients employed to form the bouquet of high-flavoured wines, are
sweet brier, orris-root, clary, cherry-laurel-water, and elder flowers. The
flavouring ingredients used by manufacturers, may all be purchased by
those dealers in wine who are initiated in the mysteries of the trade. And
even a manuscript receipt-book for preparing them, and the whole
mystery of managing all sorts of wines, may be obtained on payment of
a considerable fee.” (P. 95, 97.)
“The particular and separate department in this factitious wine-trade,
called crusting, consists in lining the interior surface of empty wine
bottles, in part, with a red crust of super-tartrate of potash, by suffering
a saturated, hot solution of this salt, coloured with a decoction of Brazil-
wood, to chrystallize within them.” (P. 101, 102.)
But the crusting is not confined to the bottle.
“A correspondent operation is performed on the wooden cask; the
whole interior of which is stained artificially with a chrystalline crust of
super-tartrate of potash, artfully affixed in a manner precisely similar to
that before stated. Thus the wine-merchant, after bottling off a pipe of
wine, is enabled to impose on the understanding of his customers, by
taking to pieces the cask, and exhibiting the beautiful dark-coloured and
fine chrystalline crust, as an indubitable proof of the age of the wine; a
practice by no means uncommon to flatter the vanity of those who pride
themselves in their acute discrimination of wines.” (P. 103, 104)
This our readers will excuse, for it is pleasing to read of
impositions which are practised on the sagacious. But, says Mr.
Accum,
“Several well-authenticated facts have convinced me, that the
adulteration of wine with substances deleterious to health is certainly
practised oftener than is, perhaps, suspected.” (P. 104, 105.)
25. Presently follows the story of the passengers by the coach, who
dined at Newark. Half a bottle of port made them all ill, one
dangerously. Part of the other half caused the death of an inhabitant
of the place, on whom an inquest was held, and a verdict returned,
of—Died by poison.
A gentleman having been taken severely ill on two successive
days, after drinking each day a pint of Madeira from the same bottle,
his apothecary ordered that it should be examined.
“‘The bottle happened to slip out of the hand of the servant, disclosed
a row of shot wedged forcibly into the angular bent-up circumference of
it. On examining the beads of shot, they crumbled into dust, the outer
crust (defended by a coat of black lead with which the shot is glazed)
being alone unacted on, whilst the remainder of the metal was dissolved.
The wine, therefore, had become contaminated with lead and arsenic,
the shot being a compound of these metals, which no doubt had
produced the mischief.’” (P. 113, 114.)
For detecting the presence of lead or any other deleterious metal
in wine, Mr. Accum recommends the wine test.
We now come to that part of the subject, which, as some persons
have thought, is merely the business of ale-drinkers, and their
brethren, the porter-drinkers.
“The fraud of imparting to porter and ale an intoxicating quality by
narcotic substances, appears to have flourished during the period of the
late French war. For, if we examine the importation lists of drugs, it will
be noticed that the quantities of cocculus indicus imported in a given
time prior to that period, will bear no comparison with the quantity
imported in the same space of time during the war, although an
additional duty was laid upon this commodity. Such has been the amount
brought into this country in five years, that it far exceeds the quantity
imported during twelve years anterior to the above epoch. The price of
this drug has risen within these ten years from two shillings to seven
shillings the pound.... It was at the period to which we have alluded that
the preparation of an extract of cocculus indicus first appeared, as a new
saleable commodity, in the price-currents of brewers’ druggists. It was at
the same time also that a Mr. Jackson, of notorious memory, fell upon the
idea of brewing beer from various drugs, without any malt and hops. This
chemist did not turn brewer himself, but he struck out the more
profitable trade of teaching his mystery to the brewers for a handsome
26. fee. From that time forward, written directions and receipt books, for
using the chemical preparations to be substituted for malt and hops,
were respectively sold. And many adepts soon afterwards appeared every
where to instruct brewers in the nefarious practice first pointed out by Mr.
Jackson. From that time, also, the fraternity of brewers’ chemists took its
rise. They made it their chief business to send
travellers all over the country with lists and samples exhibiting the
price and quality of the articles manufactured by them for the use of
brewers only. Their trade spread far and wide, but it was amongst the
country brewers chiefly that they found the most customers. And it is
among them up to the present day, as I am assured by some of these
operators, on whose veracity I can rely, that the greatest quantities of
unlawful ingredients are sold.” (P. 157-160.)
Part of these evils the porter-drinkers bring upon themselves.
“One of the qualities of good porter, is, that it should bear a fine frothy
head, as it is technically termed: because professed judges of this
beverage, would not pronounce the liquor excellent, although it
possessed all other good qualities of porter, without this requisite.—To
impart to porter this property of frothing when poured from one vessel
into another, or to produce what is also termed a cauliflower head, the
mixture called beer-heading, composed of common green vitriol
(sulphate of iron) alum and salt, is added. This addition to the beer is
generally made by the publicans.” (P. 182, 183.) It is added in a note:
—”’Alum gives likewise a smack of age to beer, and is penetrating to the
palate.’—S. Child on Brewing, p. 18.” “The great London brewers, it
appears, believe that the publicans alone adulterate the beer.” (P. 211.)
“Capsicum and grains of paradise, two highly acrid substances, are
employed to give a pungent taste to weak insipid beer. Of late, a
concentrated tincture of these articles, to be used for a similar purpose,
and possessing a powerful effect, has appeared in the price-currents of
brewers’ druggists. Ginger root, coriander seed, and orange peels, are
employed as flavouring substances chiefly by the ale brewers.” (P. 184,
185.)
We find the following articles, in a list of illegal ingredients, seized
at various breweries and brewers’ druggists.
“Multum, 84 lbs.; cocculus indicus, 12 lbs.; colouring, 4 galls; honey,
about 180 lbs.; hartshorn shavings, 14 lbs.; Spanish juice, 46 lbs.;
orange powder, 17 lbs.; ginger, 56 lbs.; grains of paradise, 44 lbs.;
quassia, 10 lbs.; liquorice, 64 lbs.; carraway seeds, 40 lbs.; multum, 26
27. lbs.” “Capsicum, 88 lbs.; copperas, 310 lbs.; colouring and drugs, 84 lbs.;
mixed drugs, 240 lbs.; coriander seed, 2 lbs.; beer colouring, 24 gallons.”
(P. 186-189.) [The list which includes these articles is copied from the
minutes of the committee of the House of Commons.]
Some of the substances above enumerated may be thought
comparatively harmless. But others are absolutely poisonous.
“To increase the intoxicating quality of beer, the deleterious vegetable
substance, called cocculus indicus, and the extract of this poisonous
berry, technically called black extract, or by some, hard multum, are
employed. Opium, tobacco, nux vomica, and extracts of poppies, have
also been used.—This fraud constitutes by far the most censurable
offence committed by unprincipled brewers. And it is a lamentable
reflection to behold so great a number of brewers prosecuted, and
convicted of this crime. Nor is it less deplorable to find the names of
druggists, eminent in trade, implicated in the fraud, by selling the
unlawful ingredients to brewers for fraudulent purposes.” (P. 205, 206.)
Then follows a list of thirty-four convictions of brewers, for
receiving or using illegal ingredients.—We perfectly agree with the
following observations.
“That a minute portion of an unwholesome ingredient, daily taken in
beer, cannot fail to be productive of mischief, admits of no doubt: and
there is reason to believe that a small quantity of a narcotic substance
(and cocculus indicus is
a powerful narcotic), daily taken into the stomach, together with an
intoxicating liquor, is highly more efficacious than it would be without the
liquor. The effect may be gradual; and a strong constitution, especially if
it be assisted with constant and hard labour, may counteract the
destructive consequences perhaps for many years. But it never fails to
show its baneful effects at last.” (P. 209, 210.)
We now come to the business of another small portion of the
community, namely, the tea-drinkers. Perhaps the following
descriptions will assist them in forming a diagnosis.
“All the samples of spurious green tea (nineteen in number) which I
have examined, were coloured with carbonate of copper, (a poisonous
substance), and not by means of verdigrise, or copperas.” (P. 240.) “Mr.
Twining asserts, that ‘the leaves of spurious tea are boiled in a copper,
with copperas and sheep’s dung.’” (P. 240. Note.) “Tea rendered
poisonous by carbonate of copper, speedily imparts to liquid ammonia, a
28. fine sapphire blue tinge. It is only necessary to shake up in a stopped
vial, for a few minutes, a tea-spoonful of the suspected leaves, with
about two table-spoonsful of liquid ammonia, diluted with half its bulk of
water. The supernatant liquid will exhibit a fine blue colour, if the
minutest quantity of copper be present. Green tea, coloured with
carbonate of copper, when thrown into water impregnated with
sulphuretted hydrogen gas, immediately acquires a black colour. Genuine
green tea, suffers no change from the action of these tests.” (P. 241.)
The following extracts may perhaps prove interesting to brandy-
drinkers.
“‘It is a custom among retailing distillers, which I have not taken notice
of in this directory, to put one third or one fourth part of proof molasses
brandy, proportionably, to what rum they dispose of; which cannot be
distinguished, but by an extraordinary palate, and does not at all lessen
the body or proof of the goods; but makes them about two shillings a
gallon cheaper; and must be well mixed and incorporated together in
your retailing cask. But you should keep some of the best rum, not
adulterated, to please your customers, whose judgment and palate must
be humoured.—When you are to draw a sample of goods to show a
person that has judgment in the proof, do not draw your goods into a
phial to be tasted, or make experiment of the strength thereof that way,
because the proof will not hold except the goods be exceedingly strong.
But draw the pattern of goods either into a glass from the cock, to run
very small, or rather draw off a small quantity into a little pewter pot, and
pour it into your glass, extending your pot as high above the glass as you
can without wasting it, which makes the goods carry a better head
abundantly, than if the same goods were to be put and tried in a phial.—
You must be so prudent as to make a distinction of the persons you have
to deal with. What goods you sell to gentlemen for their own use, who
require a great deal of attendance, and as much for time of payment,
you must take a considerably greater price than of others; what goods
you sell to persons where you believe there is a manifest, or at least
some hazard of your money, you may safely sell for more than common
profit; what goods you sell to the poor, especially medicinally, (as many
of your goods are sanative), be as compassionate as the cases require.—
All brandies, whether French, Spanish, or English, being proof goods, will
admit of one pint of liquor‘ (water) ‘to each gallon, to be made up and
incorporated therewith in your cask, for retail, or selling smaller
quantities. And all persons that insist upon having proof goods, which not
one in twenty understand, you must supply out of what goods are not so
reduced, though at a higher price.’” (P. 267-270.)
29. Some of the adulterations of spirituous liquors are exceedingly
pernicious.
“Another method of fining spirituous liquors, consists in adding to it,
first, a solution of sub-acetate of lead, and then a solution of alum. This
practice is highly dangerous, because part of the sulphate of lead
produced, remains dissolved in the liquor, which it thus renders
poisonous.” (P. 284.) “The cordial called shrub frequently exhibits vestiges
of copper.” (P. 285.)
Gloucester Cheese has been found contaminated with red lead.
The article used in colouring cheese is anotto. In one instance, the
anotto, being inferior, had been coloured with vermilion; and the
vermilion adulterated by a druggist, (who little thought that it would
ever enter into the composition of cheese,) with red lead. The
account of the whole transaction as given by Mr. Accum, is worth
reading, but too long to be extracted.
Cayenne pepper, “is sometimes adulterated with red lead, to
prevent its becoming bleached on exposure to light.” (P. 305.) Pickles
“are sometimes intentionally coloured by means of copper.” (P. 306.)
“Mrs. E. Raffald directs, ‘to render pickles green, boil them with
halfpence, or allow them to stand twenty-four hours in copper or
brass pans.’” (P. 309.) “Vinegar is sometimes largely adulterated with
sulphuric acid, to give it more acidity.” (P. 311.) “Red sugar drops are
usually coloured with the inferior kind of vermilion. This pigment is
generally adulterated with red lead. Other kinds of sweetmeats are
sometimes rendered poisonous by being coloured with preparations
of copper.” (P. 315, 316.) “The foreign conserves ... are frequently
impregnated with copper.” (P. 317.) “Quantities” of catsup “are daily
to be met with, which on a chemical examination, are found to
abound with copper.” (P. 319.) “The quantity of copper which we
have more than once detected in this sauce, used for seasoning, and
which, on account of its cheapness, is much resorted to by people in
the lower walks of life, has exceeded the proportion of lead to be
met with in other articles employed in domestic economy.” (P. 320.)
“The leaves of the cherry-laurel, prunus laurocerasus, a poisonous
plant,” are used to flavour custards, blanc-mange, and other
30. delicacies of the table. (P. 324.) An instance is given of the
dangerous consequences of this practice. (P. 325, 326.) “The water
distilled from cherry-laurel leaves is frequently mixed with brandy
and other spirituous liquors.” (P. 327.) Several samples of anchovy
sauce “have been found contaminated with lead.” (P. 328.) It is not
unusual to employ, in preparing this sauce, “a certain quantity of
Venetian red, added for the purpose of colouring it, which, if
genuine, is an innocent colouring substance. But instances have
occurred of this pigment having been adulterated with orange lead,
which is nothing else than a better kind of minimum or red oxid of
lead.” (P, 328, 329.) In lozenges, “the adulterating ingredient is
usually pipe-clay, of which a liberal portion is substituted for sugar.”
(P. 330.) Dr. T. Lloyd says, “‘I was informed,’” (at a respectable
chemist’s shop in the city) “‘that there were two kinds of ginger
lozenges kept for sale, the one at three-pence the once, and the
other at six-pence; and that the article furnished to me by mistake
was the cheaper commodity. The latter were distinguished by the
epithet verum, they being composed of sugar and ginger only. But
the former were manufactured partly of white Cornish clay, with a
portion of sugar only, with ginger and Guinea pepper. I was likewise
informed, that of Tolu lozenges, peppermint lozenges, and ginger
pearls, and several other sorts or lozenges, two kinds were kept;
that the reduced prices, as they were called, were manufactured for
those very 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’s sake, cannot charge more than the usual price of
the article, he thinks himself therefore authorized to adulterate it in
value, to make up for the risk he runs, and the long credit he must
give.’” (P. 332, 333.)
Well—there is then some honesty left in the world. What a
pleasure it is to have to deal with a respectable man. But we return
to the practices of the knaves.
31. Olive oil “is sometimes contaminated with lead.” (P. 334.) The
dealers in this commodity assert that lead or pewter “prevents the
oil from becoming rancid. And hence some retailers often suffer a
pewter measure to remain immersed in the oil.” (P. 336.) “The
beverage called soda water is frequently contaminated both with
copper and lead.” (P. 351.) Mr. Johnston, of Greek Street, Soho, was
the first who pointed out the danger to the public. “Many kinds of
viands are frequently impregnated with copper, in consequence of
the employment of cooking utensels made of that metal. By the use
of such vessels in dressing food, we are daily liable to be poisoned.”
(P. 352.) “Mr. Thiery, who wrote a thesis on the noxious quality of
copper, observes that ‘our food receives its quantity of poison, in the
kitchen by the use of copper pans and dishes. The brewer mingles
poison in our beer, by boiling it in copper vessels. The sugar-baker
employs copper pans. The pastry-cook bakes our tarts in copper
moulds. The confectioner uses copper vessels. The oilman boils his
pickles in copper or brass vessels, and verdigrise is plentifully formed
by the action of the vinegar upon the metal.’” (P. 353, 354.)
Moreover, “various kinds of food, used in domestic economy, are
liable to become impregnated with lead.” (P. 359.)
Mr. Accum, speaking on the subject of Beer, says,
“It will be noticed that some of the sophistications are comparatively
harmless, whilst others are affected by substances deleterious to health.”
(P. 185.)
We think, however, that the candour of Mr. Accum leads him to make
too much allowance for this consideration throughout. Surely, though
many articles of food be not absolutely poisonous, a diet consisting of
drugs and chemical compounds and articles never intended by nature to
be eaten or drunk, articles for which, presented simple, the hungriest
stomach would feel no appetite or inclination, cannot be wholesome.
Brick and mortar are not poison; yet we cannot, like the dragon of
Wantley, swallow a church, and pick our teeth with the steeple. Many can
eat oysters, but few could manage the oyster-knife. Even the Welshman
of King Arthur’s court, fond as he was of toasted cheese, would inevitably
have been choked by the mouse that ran down his throat to eat it, had
he not “pulled him out by the tail.”
32. We could give farther extracts; but must refer the reader to the
work itself, which contains much interesting matter, besides what we
have selected. THE MONEY THAT IS OFTEN LAID OUT IN THE
PURCHASE OF COOKERY BOOKS, WHICH TEACH THE ART OF
EXCITING DISEASE AND PAIN BY DUBIOUS COMBINATIONS AND
CULINARY POISONS, MIGHT, WE THINK, BE MUCH BETTER
EXPENDED UPON A BOOK LIKE THE PRESENT; EVERY PAGE OF
WHICH GIVES WARNING OF SOME DANGER, OF WHICH WE OUGHT
ALL TO BE AWARE.
33. A
Treatise on Adulterated Provisions.
By FREDRICK ACCUM.
THERE IS DEATH IN THE POT.
II. KINGS—CHAP. VI. VERSE XI.
(From Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, No. XXXV. Page 542.)
Mr. Accum, it appears, is one of those very good-natured friends,
who is quite resolved not to allow us to be cheated and poisoned as
our fathers were before us, and our children will be after us, without
cackling to us of our danger, and opening our eyes to abysses of
fraud and imposition, of the very existence of which we had until
now the good fortune to be entirely ignorant. His book is a perfect
death’s head, a memento mori, the perusal of any single chapter of
which is enough to throw any man into the blue devils for a
fortnight. Mr. Accum puts us something in mind of an officious
blockhead, who, instead of comforting his dying friend, is continually
jogging him on the elbow with such cheering assurances as the
following. “I am sorry there is no hope; my dear fellow, you must
kick the bucket soon. Your liver is diseased, your lungs gone, your
bowels as impenetrable as marble, your legs swelled like door-posts,
your face as yellow as a guinea, and the doctor just now assured me
you could not live a week.”
Mr. Accum’s work is evidently written in the same spirit of dark
and melancholy anticipation, which pervades Dr. Robison’s
celebrated “Proofs of a Conspiracy, &c. against all the crowned
34. heads of Europe.” The conspiracy disclosed by Mr. Accum is certainly
of a still more dreadful nature, and is even more widely ramified
than that which excited so much horror in the worthy professor. It is
a conspiracy of brewers, bakers, grocers, wine-merchants,
confectioners, apothecaries, and cooks, against the lives of all and
every one of his majesty’s liege subjects. It is easy to see that Mr.
Accum’s nerves are considerably agitated, that—
“Sad forebodings shake him as he writes.”
Not only at the festive board is he haunted by chimeras dire of
danger—not only does he tremble over the tureen—and faint over
the flesh-pot: but even in his chintz night-gown, and red morocco
slippers, he is not secure. An imaginary sexton is continually jogging
his elbow as he writes, a death’s head and cross bones rise on his
library table; and at the end of his sofa he beholds a visionary tomb-
stone of the best granite—
ON WHICH ARE INSCRIBED THE DREADFUL WORDS—
Hic Jacet,
FREDRICK ACCUM,
Operative Chemist,
35. OLD COMPTON STREET,
SOHO.
Since we read his book, our appetite has visibly decreased. At the
Celtic club, yesterday, we dined almost entirely on roast beef; Mr.
Oman’s London-particular Madeira lost all its relish, and we turned
pale in the act of eating a custard, when we recollected the dreadful
punishment inflicted on custard-eaters, in page 326 of the present
work. We beg to assure our friends, therefore, that at the present
moment they may invite us to dinner with the greatest impunity.—
Our diet is at present quite similar to that of Parnel’s hermit,
“Our food the fruits, our drink the crystal well;”
though we trust a few days will recover us from our panic, and
enable us to resume our former habits of life. Those of our friends,
therefore, who have any intention of pasturing us, had better not
lose the present opportunity of doing so. So favourable a
combination of circumstances must have been quite unhoped for on
their part, and most probably will never occur again.[24]
V. S.
24. To save some trouble, we may announce that we are already engaged to
dinner, on the 23d, 27th, and 28th of this month, and to evening parties, on
the 22d, 23d, 26th, 28th, and 29th, and 3d of March.
Since, by the publication of Mr. Accum’s book, an end has been for
ever put to our former blessed state of ignorance, let us arm
ourselves with philosophy, and boldly venture to look our danger in
the face; or, as the poet beautifully expresses it, in language
singularly applicable,
36. “Come, Christopher, and leave all meaner things,
To low ambition and the pride of kings;
Let us, since life can little else supply;
Than just to swallow poison and to die;
Expatiate free o’er all this dreadful field,
Try what the brewer, what the baker yield;
Explore the druggists’ shop, the butchers’ stall;
Expose their roguery, and—damn them all!”
Pope.
Melancholy as the details are, there is something almost ludicrous,
we think, in the very extent to which the deceptions are carried. So
inextricably are we all immersed in this mighty labyrinth of fraud,
that even the venders of poison themselves are forced, by a sort of
retributive justice, to swallow it in their turn.—Thus the apothecary,
who sells the poisonous ingredients to the brewer, chuckles over his
roguery, and swallows his own drugs in his daily copious exhibitions
of Brown stout. The brewer in his turn, is poisoned by the baker, the
wine-merchant, and the grocer. And, whenever the baker’s stomach
fails him, he meets his coup de grace in the adulterated drugs of his
friend the apothecary, whose health he has been gradually
contributing to undermine, by feeding him every morning on chalk
and alum, in the shape of hot rolls.
Our readers will now, we think, be able to form a general idea of
the perils to which they are exposed by every meal.
Mr. Accum’s details on the adulteration of wine are extremely
ample, and so interesting, that we regret our limits prevent our
making more copious extracts, and oblige us to refer our readers for
farther information to the work itself.
Having thus laid open to our view the arcana of the cellar, Mr.
Accum next treats us with an expose of the secrets of the brew-
house. Verily, the wine-merchant and brewer are par nobile fratrum;
and after the following disclosures, it will henceforth be a matter of
the greatest indifference to us, whether we drink Perry or
Champaigne, Hermitage or Brown stout. Latet anguis in poculo,
there is disease and death in them all, and one is only preferable to
37. the other, because it will poison us at about one-tenth of the
expense.
“Malt liquors, and particularly porter, the favourite beverage of the
inhabitants of London and of other large towns, is amongst those
articles, in the manufacture of which the greatest frauds are frequently
committed.
“The practice of adulterating beer appears to be of early date. To shew
that they have augmented in our own days, we shall exhibit an abstract
from documents laid lately before Parliament.
“Mr. Accum not only amply proves, that unwholesome ingredients are
used by fraudulent brewers, and that very deleterious substances are
also vended both to brewers and publicans for adulterating beer, but that
the ingredients mixed up in the brewer’s enchanting cauldron are placed
above all competition, even with the potent charms of Macbeth’s witches:
‘Root of hemlock, digg’d i’ the dark,
* * * *
* * * *
For a charm of pow’rful trouble.
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble;
Double, double, toil and trouble,
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.’
Mr. Accum very properly gives us a list of those miscreants who
have been convicted of adulterating their porter with poisonous
ingredients, and want of room alone prevents us from damning them
to everlasting fame, by inserting their names along with that of the
Rev. Sennacherib Terrot, in the imperishable pages of this miscellany.
Mr. Accum gives us a long dissertation on counterfeit tea, and
another on spurious coffee; but as these are impositions by which
we are little affected, we shall not allow them to detain us. The
leaves of the sloe-thorn are substituted for the former, and roasted
horse beans for the latter. These frauds, it appears, are carried to a
very great extent.
We must now draw our extracts to a close; but we can assure our
readers, that we have not yet introduced them to one tythe of the
poisonous articles in common use, detected by Mr. Accum. We shall
38. give the titles of a few to satisfy the curious:—Poisonous
confectionary, poisonous pickles, poisonous cayenne pepper,
poisonous custards, poisonous anchovy sauce, poisonous lozenges,
poisonous lemon acid, poisonous mushrooms, poisonous ketchup,
and poisonous soda water! Read this, and wonder how you live!
While we thus suffer under accumulated miseries brought upon us
by the unprincipled avarice and cupidity of others, it is surely
incumbent on us not wantonly to increase the catalogue by any
negligence or follies of our own. Will it be believed, that in the
cookery book, which forms the prevailing oracle of the kitchens in
this part of the island, there is an express injunction to “boil greens
with halfpence in order to improve their colour?”—That our puddings
are frequently seasoned with laurel leaves, and our sweetmeats
almost uniformly prepared in copper vessels? Why are we thus
compelled to swallow a supererogatorary quantity of poison which
may so easily be avoided? And why are we constantly made to run
the risk of our lives by participating in custards, trifles, and
blancmanges, seasoned by a most deadly poison extracted from the
prunus lauro-cerasus? Verily, while our present detestable system of
cookery remains, we may exclaim with the sacred historian, that
there is indeed “Death in the Pot.”
39. A Treatise on Adulterations of Food,
AND CULINARY POISONS,
Exhibiting the Fraudulent Sophistications of Bread, Beer, Wine,
Spirituous Liquors, &c. and Methods of detecting them.
By FREDRICK ACCUM.
(From the Edinburgh Review, No. LXV. Page 131.)
It is curious to see how vice varies its forms, and maintains its
substance, in all conditions of society;—and how certainly those
changes, or improvements as we call them, which diminish one class
of offences, aggravate or give birth to another.—In rude and simple
communities, most crimes take the shape of violence and outrage—
in polished and refined ones, of Fraud. Men sin from their animal
propensities in the first case, and from their intellectual depravation
in the second. The one state of things is prolific of murders,
batteries, rapines, and burnings—the other of forgeries, swindlings,
defamations, and seductions. The sum of evil is probably pretty
much the same in both—though probably greatest in the civilized
and enlightened stages; the sharpening of the intellect, and the
spread of knowledge, giving prodigious force and activity to all
criminal propensities.
Among the offences which are peculiar to a refined and
enlightened society, and owe their birth, indeed, to its science and
refinement, are those skilful and dexterous adulterations of the
manifold objects of its luxurious consumption, to which their value
and variety, and the delicacy of their preparation, hold out so many
temptations; while the very skill and knowledge which are requisite
in their formation, furnish such facilities for their sophistication. The
40. very industry and busy activity of such a society, exposes it more
and more to such impostures;—and by the division of labour which
takes place, and confines every man to his own separate task, brings
him into a complete dependence on the industry of others for a
supply of the most necessary articles.
The honesty of the dealer, and of the original manufacturer, is the
only security to the public for the genuineness of the article in which
he deals. The consumer can in general know nothing of their
component parts; he must take them as he finds them; and, even if
he is dissatisfied, he has in general no effectual means of redress.
It will be found, that as crimes of violence decrease with the
progress of society, frauds are multiplied; and there springs up in
every prosperous country a race of degenerate traders and
manufacturers, whose business is to cheat and to deceive; who
pervert their talents to the most dishonest purposes, prefering the
illicit gains thus acquired to the fair profits of honorable dealing; and
counter-working, by their sinister arts, the general improvement of
society.
In almost every branch of manufacture, there are fraudulent
dealers, who are instigated by the thirst of gain, to debase the
articles which they vend to the public, and to exact a high price for
what is comparatively cheap and worthless. After pointing out
various deceptions of this nature, Mr. Accum, the ingenious author of
the work before us, proceeds in his account of those frauds, in the
following terms.
‘Soap used in house-keeping is frequently adulterated with a
considerable portion of fine white clay, brought from St. Stephen’s in
Cornwall. In the manufacture of printing paper, a large quantity of plaster
of Paris is added to the paper stuff, to increase the weight of the
manufactured article. The selvage of cloth is often dyed with a
permanent colour, and artfully stitched to the edge of cloth dyed with a
fugitive dye. The frauds committed in the tanning of skins, and in the
manufacture of cutlery, and jewellery, exceed belief.’ pp. 27-29.
What is infinitely worse, however, than any of those frauds,
sophistications, we are informed, are carried on to an equal extent in
41. all the essential articles of subsistence or comfort. So long as our
dishonest dealers do not intermeddle with these things, their
deceptions are comparatively harmless; the evil in all such cases
amounting only to so much pecuniary damage. But when they begin
to tamper with food, or with articles connected with the table, their
frauds are most pernicious: in all cases the nutritive quality of the
food is injured, by the artificial ingredients intermixed with it; and
when these ingredients, as frequently happens, are of a poisonous
quality, they endanger the health and even the life of all to whom
they are vended. We cannot conceive any thing more diabolical than
those contrivances; and we consider their authors in a far worse
light than ordinary felons, who, being known, can be duly guarded
against. But those fraudulent dealers conceal themselves under the
fair show of a reputable traffic—they contrive in this manner to
escape the infamy which justly belongs to them—and, under the
disguise of wealth, credit, and character, to lurk in the bosom of
society, wounding the hand that cherishes them, and scattering
around them poison and death.
It is chiefly for the purpose of laying open the dishonest artifices
of this class of dealers, that Mr. Accum has published the present
very interesting and popular work; and he gives a most fearful view
of the various and extensive frauds which are daily practised on the
unsuspecting public.
‘Among the number of substances used in domestic economy, which
are now very generally found sophisticated, may be distinguished—tea,
coffee, bread, beer, wine, spirituous liquors, salad oil, pepper, vinegar,
mustard, cream, and other articles of subsistence.—Indeed, it would be
difficult to mention a single article of food which is not to be met with in
an adulterated state; and there are some substances which are scarcely
ever to be procured genuine.—Some of these spurious compounds are
comparatively harmless when used as food; and as, in these cases,
merely substances of inferior value are substituted for more costly and
genuine ingredients, the sophistication, though it may affect our purse,
does not injure our health. Of this kind are the manufacture of factitious
pepper, the adulterations of mustard, vinegar, cream, &c. Others,
however, are highly deleterious; and to this class belong the adulterations
42. of beer, wines, spirituous liquors, pickles, salad oil, and many others.’ pp.
2-4.
There are, it appears, particular chemists who make it their sole
employment to supply the unprincipled brewer of porter and ale with
drugs, and other deleterious preparations; while others perform the
same office to the wine and spirit merchant, as well as to the grocer
and oilman—and these illicit pursuits have assumed all the order and
method of a regular trade.
‘The eager and insatiable thirst for gain’ (Mr. Accum justly observes),
which seems to be a leading characteristic of the times, calls into action
every human faculty, and gives an irresistible impulse to the power of
invention; and where lucre becomes the reigning principle, the possible
sacrifice of a fellow-creature’s life is a secondary consideration.’
Mr. Accum having exhibited this general view of his subject,
proceeds to enter into an examination of the articles most commonly
counterfeited, and to explain the nature of the ingredients used in
sophisticating them. He commences with a dissertation on the
qualities of good water, in which he briefly points out the dangerous
sophistications to which it is liable, from the administration of foreign
ingredients.
But in the case of water, the adulteration is purely accidental,
which cannot be said of the other articles specified by Mr. Accum. In
the making of Bread, more especially in London, various ingredients
are occasionally mingled with the dough. To suit the caprice of his
customers, the baker is obliged to have his bread light and porous,
and of a pure white. It is impossible to produce this sort of bread
from flour alone, unless it be of the finest quality. The best flour,
however, being mostly used by the biscuit-bakers and pastry-cooks,
it is only from the inferior sorts that bread is made; and it becomes
necessary, in order to have it of that light and porous quality, and of
a fine white, to mix alum with the dough. Without this ingredient,
the flour used by the London bakers would not yield so white a
bread as that sold in the metropolis.
Wine appears to be a subject for the most extensive and
pernicious frauds.
43. ‘All persons (Mr. Accum observes) moderately conversant with the
subject, are aware, that a portion of alum is added to young and meagre
red wines, for the purpose of brightening their colour; that Brazil wood,
or the husks of elderberries and bilberries, which are imported from
Germany, under the fallacious name of berry-dye, are employed to impart
a deep rich purple tint to red port of a pale colour; that gypsum is used
to render cloudy white wines transparent; that an additional astringency
is imparted to immature red wines by means of oak-wood and sawdust,
and the husks of filberts; and that a mixture of spoiled foreign and home-
made wines is converted into the wretched compound frequently sold in
the metropolis by the name genuine old Port.’
Other expedients are resorted to, in order to give flavour to insipid
wines. For this purpose bitter almonds are occasionally employed;
factitious port wine is also flavoured with a tincture drawn from the
seeds of raisins; and other ingredients are frequently used, such as
sweet brier, orris root, clary, cherry-laurel water, and elder flowers.
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
44. 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
45. 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
46. 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
47. 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
48. 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.
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