Called by the Tartars KOUMISS. 189 



what I have been able to learn from others refpedling that which 

 is the inoft common, the milk of cows. 



Dr PALLAS*, in the work above quoted, fays, that cows 

 milk is alfo fufceptible of the vinous fermentation, and that 

 the Tartars prepare a wine from it in winter, when mares milk 

 fails them ; that the wine prepared from cows milk, they call 

 Airen ', but that they always prefer Koumifs when it can be got, 

 as it is more agreeable, and contains a greater quantity of fpi- 

 rit ; that Koumifs on diftillation yields of a weak fpirit one third, 

 but that Airen yields only two ninth parts of its whole quan- 

 tity y which fpirit they call Arlka. 



THIS account is confirmed by OSERETSKOWSKY, a Ruffian f, 

 who accompanied LEPECHIN, and other academicians, in their 

 travels through Siberia and Tartary. He publifhed lately a 

 DifTertation on the ardent fpirit to be obtained from cows milk. 



FROM his experiments, it appears, that cows milk may be fer- 

 mented with, or even without, fouring, provided fufficient time 

 and agitation be employed ; that no fpirit could be produced 

 from any one of its conflituent parts taken feparately, nor from 

 any two of them, unlefs inafmuch as they were mixed with 

 fome part of the third j that the milk, with all its parts in their 

 natural proportion, was the moft productive of it j that the 

 clofer it was kept, or, which is the fame thing, the more diffi- 

 cultly the fixed air is allowed to efcape during the fermentation, 

 (care being taken, however, that we do not endanger the burft- 

 ing of the veflel), the more fpirit is obtained. He alfo informs 

 us, that it had a fourer fmell before than after agitation ; that 

 the quantity of fpirit was increafed, by allowing the fermented 

 liquor to repofe for fome time before diftillation ; that from fix 

 pints of milk, fermented in a clofe veffel, and thus fet to repofe, 

 he obtained three ounces of ardent fpirit, of which one was 



confumed 



* Phyficalifch. Reife durch verfchied. provintz. des Ruflifch. Reichs, t. I. p. 316. 

 t 317. 



\ Specim. inaug. de Spir. Ardent, ex laft. Bub. Argentorat. 1778. 



