62 BREWING BEER. [No. 



messing ! The cottage everlastingly in a litter ; the 

 woman's hands everlastingly wet and dirty ; the 

 children grimed up to the eyes with dust fixed on by 

 potato-starch ; and ragged as colts, the poor mother's 

 time all being devoted to the everlasting boilings of 

 the pot ! Can any man, who knows any thing of the 

 labourer's life, deny this ? And will, then, any body, 

 except the old shuffle-breeches band of the Quarterly 

 'Review, who have all their lives been moving from 

 garret to garret, who have seldom seen the sun, and 

 never the dew except in print; will any body except 

 these men say, that the people ought to be taught to 

 use potatoes as a substitute for bread ? 



BREWING BEER. 



108. THIS matter has been fully treated of in the 

 two last numbers. But several correspondents wish- 

 ing to fall upon some means of rendering the prac- 

 tice beneficial to those who are unable to purchase 

 brewing utensils, have recommended the lending 1 of 

 them, or letting out, round a neighbourhood. Another 

 correspondent has, therefore, pointed out to me an 

 Act of Parliament which touches upon this subject; 

 and, indeed, what of Excise Laws and Custom Laws 

 and Combination Laws and Libel Laws, a human 

 being in this country scarcely knows what he dares 

 do or what he dares say. What father, for instance, 

 would have imagined, that, having brewing utensils, 

 which two men carry from house to house as easily 

 as they can a basket, he dared not lend them to his 

 son, living in the next street, or at the next door ? 

 Yet such really is the law ; for, according to the Act 

 5th of the 22 and 23 of that honest and sincere gen- 

 tleman Charles II., there is a penalty of 50/. for lend- 

 ing or letting brewing utensils. However, it has this 

 limit ; that the penalty is confined to Cities, Corpo- 

 rate Torfhs, and Market Towns, WHERE THERE is A 

 PUBLIC BREWHOUSE. So that, in the first place, you 

 may let, or lend, in any place where there is no pub- 

 lic brewhouse; and in all towns not corporate or 



