476 BREAD 



It is said that stale urino heightens the colour of Brazil dyo when the ground wood 

 is moistened with it. 



Chevroul obtained the colouring matter from Brazil wood in the following manner : 

 Digest the raspings of the wood in water till all the colouring matter is dissolved, and 

 evaporate the infusion to dryncss, to get rid of a little acetic acid which it contains. 

 Dissolve the residue in water, and agitato the solution with litharge, to get rid of a 

 little fixed acid. Evaporate again to dryness ; digest the residue in alcohol ; filter and 

 evaporate, to drive off the alcohol. Dilute the residual matter with water, and add to 

 the liquid a solution of glue, till all the tannin which it contains is thrown down ; 

 filter again, and evaporate to dryness, and digest the residue in alcohol, which will 

 leave undissolved any excess of glue which may have been added. The last alcoholic 

 solution, being evaporated to dryness, leaves braziUn, the colouring matter of the 

 wood, in a state of considerable purity. 



BRAZIXi. A term given to a hard coal, approaching Anthracite in character, in 

 South Staffordshire. 



BRAZII^m* and BRAZXXiXEKT are two colouring matters which have been 

 separated from Brazil wood, by Chevreul and Preisser. They are probably identical. 

 See Watts's ' Dictionary of Chemistry.' 



BRAZING. See SOLDEBS and SOLDERING. 



BREAD. One of the most important, if not altogether the most important, article 

 of food, unquestionably, is bread ; and although rye, barley, oats, and other cereals, 

 are sometimes used by the baker, wlieat is the grain which is best fitted for the manu- 

 facture of that article, not only on account of the larger amount of gluten, or nitro- 

 genous matter, which it contains, and than can be found in other edible grains, but 

 also on account of the almost exact balance in which the nitrogenous and non- 

 nitrogenous constituents exist in that cereal, and owing to which it is capable of 

 ministering to all the requirements of the human frame, and of being assimilated at 

 once and without effort by our organs, whence the name of ' staff of life,' which is 

 often given to it, wheat being, like milk, a perfect food. 



Although gluten is one of the most important constituents of wheat, the nutritive 

 power of its flour, and its value as a bread-making material, should not be altogether 

 considered as dependent upon the quantity of gluten it may contain, even though it 

 bo of the best quality. Doubtless a high per-centage of this material is desirable, but 

 there are other considerations which must be taken into account; for, in order to 

 become available for making good bread, flour, in addition to being sound and genuine, 

 must possess other qualities beyond containing merely a large amount of gluten. 

 Thus, for example, the ble rouge glace cCAuvcrgne, which contains hardly 45 per cent, 

 of starch, and as much as 36 per cent, of gluten, though admirably adapted for the 

 manufacture of macaroni, vermicelli, semolina, and other pates d' Italic, is totally 

 unfit for making good bread ; the flour used for making best white loaves containing 

 only from 13 to 18 per cent, of gluten, and from 60 to 70 per cent, of starch. 



Bread is obtained by baking a dough, previously fermented either by an admix- 

 ture of yeast or leaven, or it is artificially rendered spongy by causing an acid, 

 muriatic or tartaric, to react upon carbonate or bicarbonate of soda, or of ammonia, 

 mixed in the doughy mass ; or, is in Dr. Dauglish's process, which will bo described 

 further on, by mixing the flour which has to be converted into dough, not with 

 ordinary water, but with water strongly impregnated with carbonic acid. 



Although a history of bread making cannot bo given in the present article, a 

 few words on the subject, reproduced from a former edition of this work, will not be 

 deemed \ininteresting. 



Pliny informs us, that barley was the only species of corn at first used for food ; and 

 even after the method of reducing it to flour had been discovered, it was long before 

 mankind learned the art of converting it into cakes. 



Ovens were first invented in the East. Their construction was understood by the 

 Jews, the Greeks, and the Asiatics, among whom baking was practised as a distinct 

 profession. In this art, the Cappadocians, Lydians, and Phronicians, are said to have 

 particularly excelled. It was not till about 580 years after the foundation of Borne 

 that these artisans passed into Europe. The Roman armies, on their return from 

 Macedonia, brought Grecian bakers with them into Italy. As these bakors had 

 handmills besides their ovens, they still continued to be called pistores, from the ancient 

 practice of bruising the corn in a mortar ; and their bakehouses wore denominated 

 pistoria. In the time of Augustus there were no fewer than 329 public bakehouses 

 in Rome ; almost the whole of which were in the hands of Greeks, who long con- 

 tinued the only persons in that city acquainted with the art of baking good bread. 



In nothing, perhaps, is the wise and cautious policy of the Roman government moro 

 remarkably displayed than in the regulations which it imposed on the bakers within 

 the city. To the foreign bakers who camo to Rome with the army from Macedonia, 



