MALTING 185 



occupied in a perpetual effort to protect his interests from fiscal regulations conceived 

 in a most hostile spirit. The carelessness and ignorance of common workmen may 

 at any moment subject the most honest maltster in the kingdom, not merely to 

 charges of dishonesty, but even to penal inflictions; which have ceased to carry 

 moral degradation with them, only because of the popular belief of their injustice. 

 It would be impossible, nor is it requisite, to follow out or recapitulate the in- 

 numerable annoyances to which the manufacturer of malt is subjected at present : 

 we have thus briefly noted down a few, in order that the admirers of Bavarian and 

 other foreign beers may take into account the very different state of the malt manu- 

 facture in this country, as compared with that brought about by an unrestricted 

 liberty to use or apply any means which the nature of the grain, the condition of 

 the atmosphere, or other accidental circumstances, may require during the process of 

 germination. 



Having thus seen the restricticns imposed by the legislature, we need only indicate 

 that the capacities of the cistern, the couch, and the kiln should be adapted to contai* 

 respectively the whole quantity of barley or malt made at one steeping, and this 

 should again have reference to the space allotted to the floor, which should allow of 

 at least three steepings to be worked on it without interference in their different stages 

 of growth and withering. 



The process of malting consists of three successive operations : the steeping ; the 

 couching, sweating, flooring ; and the kiln-drying. 



It often happens from various reasons that the importance of extreme care in the 

 selection of barley for malting is overlooked, but the injurious consequences re- 

 sulting from such a laxity are so great that they cannot be too strongly impressed 

 upon the attention of the party entrusted with this duty. All barleys that have 

 been weathered in the field, or have got mow-burnt or musty in the stack, should be 

 rigidly rejected ; they are so easily detected that there is no room for accidental 

 oversight. Weathered barley has a dull and often a dirty appearance, quite dis- 

 tinct from the bright shotty character of good samples, and frequently a sprouted 

 corn or two may be seen amongst them, but the last is the least evil of the three, 

 as the sprouted corns may to some extent be removed by carefully swimming the 

 barley (at the time the cistern is charged) and floating off the lighter grains. But 

 with mow-burnt and musty barley the grain has suffered so much that a sound 

 wort out of malt made from mow-burnt barley cannot be obtained. This evil arises 

 chiefly from the barley having been stacked in an insufficiently dry state; subse- 

 quently it has become overheated and its germinating principle destroyed ; there : 

 no remedy, it cannot be reclaimed, it is spoilt for malting purposes, more or less 

 according to the circumstances immediately attending it. It may be detected by 

 a peculiarly faint, sickly smell, perhaps the word 'stink' more nearly describes it; 

 in addition to that, it may be at once suspected if some of the grains have a dis- 

 colouration varying from red to black at the radicle end ; such grains when thrown 

 into the couch after steeping will often exhibit a brownish-red appearance from end to 

 nd ; if broken they will display a red-tinted kernel and show an unmistakeable rotten- 

 ness ; on the floor they will impart that odour of rotten apples, so disheartening to 

 the careful maltster, especially if he be brewer also ; and after being dried on the 

 kiln, a minute examination of them will disclose a kernel of a yellowish and some- 

 times a brownish tinge, which otherwise ought to be perfectly white and flowery. 

 Beer brewed from such malt is liable to ferment with uncontrollable violence, and 

 will soon turn sourish, bad, or stinking, according to the degree of injury the barley 

 has suffered. 



Musty barley of course can easily be detected by the smell, and a slight appearance 

 of mould may generally be detected upon the ends and belly of the grain ; if it is very 

 slight indeed it need not condemn an otherwise good sample, but if it arises from being 

 overheated in the hold of a vessel it should not be malted. Broken and bruised corns, 

 and corns crushed by the feet or shovel upon the withering floor, have precisely^ the 

 same effect and result as mow-burnt barley ; for this reason, therefore, the thrashing- 

 machines now in such general use have need of great improvement, as they break the 

 corns to a fearful extent, the more so when the season has been exceptionally dry, and 

 the finest and boldest corns suffer most. 



Another unfavourable symptom is when the beard has not been entirely removed, 

 some of the corns retaining portions of it attached ; this is an indication that the 

 mellowing in the stack has been imperfect when the grain was thrashed, the beard 

 has therefore remained tough, and the operation has been unable therefore to detach 

 them : it is generally attendant on weathered grain. 



The Malting. It is a good plan as a rule to have all barley shot into its binn as 

 soon as possible, and there allowed to remain till it is wanted for malting; the 



