234 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



and its enforcement made obligatory upon the state board of health, as 

 is done in Indiana, or some other means adopted to see that it is respected. 



A few months' energetic work by any competent man would secure the 

 cooperation, or failing that, the conviction, of enough dealers to drive 

 every barrel of spurious cider vinegar out of the state of Michigan. 

 Happily some of the other states of the Union, mainly in the east, but 

 Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Minnesota in the west, have satisfactory 

 vinegar laws and commissioners to see that they are enforced, with the 

 results that cider interests have taken great strides in advance during the 

 past few years, and apple-growers and cider-makers are correspondingly 

 better satisfied with the world's justice. It remains for Michigan, the 

 second apple state in the Union, to be shown by Minnesota, which has no 

 apple interests, where only common honesty demands this reform; and I 

 believe that the honorable representatives of this state require only to 

 have their attention called to this injustice to the people and injury to a 

 great interest, to take the proper steps to change it at once. 



To that end it behooves every man who has an apple tree in his back 

 yard, as well as every cider-maker in the state, to labor with the repre- 

 sentative from his district and point out the road that leads to salvation. 

 A unanimous effort in this direction this winter will accomplish the result 

 that simple fairness demands, while the growing and future crops of cider 

 and cider vinegar will be enhanced in value some 50 per cent. 



My strong feeling upon this matter must be my excuse for referring to 

 it at such length here, and I shall now return to the mode of vinegar 

 manufacture. 



The vinegar generator, as heretofore mentioned, can be used equally to 

 advantage in making cider vinegar as well as low-wine goods. It is an 

 upright tank or tub filled with curled beach or maple shavings made 

 expressly for this purpose and through which the air circulates by entering 

 one or more air holes about six inches from the bottom and escaping 

 through a perforated cover or false top placed inside about six inches from 

 the top. Great care is necessary to regulate the circulation of the air, 

 which can be done by means of the air inlets, to the temperature and action 

 of the generator, as the shavings are merely for the purpose of giving a 

 wide surface and the exjaosure of the liquid to the action of the oxygen 

 of the air which converts the alcohol into acetic acid, thereby heating the 

 shavings with the danger that they may become too hot and so vitiate the 

 oxygen in the air, creating aldehyde, and also cause the alcohol to evapo- 

 rate, as alcohol evaporates at ninety degrees Fahrenheit. To bring a vine- 

 egar generator into working order requires much time and expense, and it 

 must be given thereafter every day, including Sunday and holidays, the 

 quantity of raw material it requires or can digest. It can not be overfed, 

 neither can it be starved at any time, in fact, it is comparable in this 

 respect to the human system. As long as it is given its regular rations 

 and guarded against atmospheric or other changes, so long it will remain 

 healthy and in good working condition ; but insufficient or overfeeding is 

 equally injurious and the manufacturer will have the same trouble bring- 

 ing it around that a doctor frequently experiences with his patients. 



It has been demonstrated to the satisfaction of most modern vinegar 

 makers that the best size for a generator is about eight feet high by four 

 and one half in diameter, though many claim superiority for those twice 

 that height and a little wider. 



The generating or quick process of making vinegar accomplishes in a 



