316 THE FLOKAL WORLD AND GARDEN GUIDE. 



TEE AET OF BREWING. 



THE preparation of beer is one of the most important 

 processes of domestic economy, and, if conducted upon 

 scientific principles, is productive of a beverage which, 

 moderately used, is, perhaps, as salubrious to the 

 generality of persons, as anything can be that possesses 

 intoxicating qualities. We shall not hamper our subject with 

 technicalities or difficulties, but simply define brewing as the art of 

 extracting a saccharine and mucilaginous fluid from the malt of 

 barley, and of combining it with the bitter principle of the hop only ; 

 and by fermentation, reducing these combined principles to a fluid, 

 holding the flavouring extractive matters of the two substances 

 employed, in union with a greater or less proportion of an alcoholic 

 spirit, according to the bulk and quality of the malt employed. 



Beers are said to be prepared from various other saccharine 

 substances, and to be rendered properly bitter by other matters 

 than the hop. We reject all such assertions as vague, and tending 

 to produce disgust and disappointment. It is readily admitted 

 that fluids, possessing vinous or alcoholic properties, may be pre- 

 pared from the matters alluded to; but having tested the products 

 of some of them, and heard the opinions of other persons on the 

 subject, we are induced, after the experience of above thirty years, 

 wherein we have practised and overlooked the art of brewing, to say 

 that good English beer and ale can be procured from the best 

 malt and hops only, and from no other substances whatsoever. 



Brewing, to be successfully practised, must be more or less 

 understood in its principles ; that is the science of the art, and 

 it is described in a very excellent work upon general subjects which 

 we have seen, as comprehending " a knowledge of the properties of 

 the substances employed, and the principles of fermentation, together 

 with a constant attention to the temperature and specific gravity 

 of the wort," so as to secure " an uniformly successful production 

 of good beer, combining, as it ought to do, the requisites of clear- 

 ness, soundness, and of that full measure of strength and flavour 

 which can be derived from the materials employed. Without this 

 knowledge as a guide, the success of the process will be, at the best, 

 but uncertain, because changes in the temperature of the air, varia- 

 tions of the weather,or atmospheric pressure, may render modifications 

 necessary, of which no judgment can be formed by positive rule." 



The admission contained in the last line of the quotation com- 

 prises the pith and marrow of the whole ; for, while it is added 

 that the knowledge of the principles required is most desirable, 

 it is placed beyond all doubt, by experience, that brewing and its 

 results are mysterious processes, more or less removed from the art 

 and power of man. 



Those mighty electrical mutatious which govern the direction 

 and operations of wind, and induce the formation and dispersion 

 of atmospheric vapours and masses of clouds, constitute the primum 

 mobile of the process of fermentation — a process upon which the 

 quality and maturity of the liquor produced wholly depends. A 



