3o8 



NA TURE 



[September 9, 1909 



region. A mere " dash " to the pole may awaken a 

 certain amount of sentimental interest, and direct 

 public nltentlon to the traveller, but it is of no value 

 from the scientific point of view unless exploration — 

 physical or geographical — is carried on. Commander 

 Peary appears to have been equipped with apparatus 

 for taking soundings and making other observations 

 of polar conditions, and he has telegraphed to the 

 director of the American Museum of Natural History, 

 New York, " I am bringing a large amount of 

 material for the museum." The scientific importance 

 of polar expeditions must be judged by the new 

 knowledge obtained rather than by the determination 

 of a mathematical point more or less accurately 

 according to the instruments used and precautions 

 taken. Assuming that the North Pole has been 

 reached by one or both the explorers, the way is now 

 clear for the scientific study of Arctic hydrography, 

 meteorology, and many other problems of terrestrial 

 physics without the disturbing effort to attain the 

 highest latitude. 



THE WHISKEY COMMISSION. 



'TTHE Royal Commission on Whiskey and other Pot- 

 ■*■ able Spirits, the final report of which has just 

 been issued, originated out of the attempts made bv 

 various local authorities to obtain legal decisions as 

 to what should or should not constitute brandy and 

 whiskey. In the case of the other recognised forms 

 of ordinary potable spirits, no acute differences of 

 opinion appear to have arisen. When a man asked 

 for rum or gin the legal mind representing the man 

 in the street was content to assume that that long- 

 suffering individual received an article of the nature, 

 substance, and quality he demanded. As a matter of 

 fact, the man in the street raised no difficulty even 

 about the two forms of potable spirits which have 

 more particularly engaged tlie prolonged attention of 

 the Royal Commission. He had absolutely no interest 

 in the touching solicitude which was displayed on his 

 behalf by a number of professional gentlemen, who, 

 apparently from purely altruistic motives, were deter- 

 mined that he should be awakened to a proper sense 

 of the importance of knowing the origin and mode of 

 manufacture of articles which he had hitherto been 

 perfectly content to purchase because he was satisfied 

 with their quality and price. 



What is brandy and what is whiskey have been the 

 occasional subjects of discussion in the public journals 

 and in the trade organs at intervals during the past 

 three or four years, but it has been impossible to 

 arouse any public feeling on these momentous ques- 

 tions. The fact is, the agitation, such as it was, was 

 wholly artificial. It simply originated in, and turned 

 upon, a struggle between competing trade interests. 

 Brandy, by use and wont, has been universally re- 

 garded as a spirit obtained by the distillation of fer- 

 mented grape-juice ; whiskey as a spirit obtained by 

 the distillation of a fermented " wash " derived from 

 some form of cereal, usually, but not invariably or 

 wholly, malted barley. But owing to the unfortunate 

 grape disease (Phylloxera) which, a generation ago, 

 devastated the French vineyards, especially in the 

 Charentes, where the particular grapes mainly 

 employed in the manufacture of Cognac are grown, 

 the manufacture of factitious brandy was greatly 

 stimulated. This consisted of some form of distilled 

 spirit — obtained usually from grain, or from beetroot 

 molasses, or, occasionally, from potatoes, artificially 

 flavoured with " brandy essence " and coloured with 

 caramel. This article entered into competition, not 

 only with the genuine product, but with a factitious 

 brandy "drawn and made from malted corn," which 

 NO. 2080, VOL. Si] 



has been produced for more than a couple of centuries 

 in this country under the name of " British brandy," 

 a term first legallv sanctioned by the Spirits Acts of 

 i860. In due time the vineyards were re-planted, the 

 Charente vines being grafted on American stocks, and 

 the manufacture of Cognac by the time-honoured 

 methods was re-established. Naturally the manufac- 

 turers contended that their product was the only 

 legitimate brandy, and that the factitious articles were 

 not entitled to the name of Cognac, or when sold in 

 this country to the term brandy, unless this was 

 qualified, as in the case of " British brandy," by some 

 prefix which should serve to differentiate it from the 

 product of the grape. 



This, then, as regards brandy, is the fous et origo 

 of the trouble. It was useless for the contending 

 parties to appeal to our law, since, as the Commission 

 states, there is no statutory definition of the term 

 " brandy "; nor is there any binding judicial decision 

 on the subject. The 148th Section of the Spirits Act 

 of i860, it is true, contained an implied definition of 

 " British brandy," which would have covered the case 

 of all factitious b.-andies sold in this country, whether 

 made here or not, but this was repealed in 1880, so 

 that there is no longer a legal definition even of 

 " British brandy." 



As regards whiskey, the cause of contention was not 

 so much the nature of the material from which the 

 spirit was derived, although this did to some extent 

 enter into consideration, as the manner in which the 

 distillation was effected. Originally all whiskey was 

 made by means of comparatively small stills — of the 

 type known as pot-stills — in which the fermented wort 

 was distilled by the direct application of fire. But 

 about the year 183 1, Eneas Coffey invented and 

 patented a form of still adapted for continuous work- 

 ing, in which the alcohol is driven out of the wort 

 by means of steam, and the mixture of steam and 

 spirit is then separated by an ingeniously contrived 

 condensing or rectifying arrangement which enables 

 a much " cleaner " spirit to be produced — that is, a 

 spirit much more free from what are held to con- 

 stitute the characteristic constituents of whiskey, as 

 distinguished from plain spirit. This process not only 

 resulted in the production of a purer form of alcohol — ■ 

 that is, purer in the sense commonly understood by 

 chemists — but it was more economical in use, and 

 consequently materially cheapened the cost of produc- 

 tion. This, of course, made the " patent still " a 

 formidable competitor of the "pot-still," and those 

 who had a vested interest in the pot-still naturally 

 complained that this interest was jeopardised by the 

 employment of a piece of apparatus which might 

 make alcohol, but, it was contended, did not neces- 

 sarily make whiskey. 



In the autumn of 1905 the Islington Borough 

 Council was induced to bring two test cases before a 

 London stipendiary under Section 6 of the Sale of 

 Food and Drugs Acts, in one of which it was held that 

 a certain publican had sold, to the prejudice of a pur- 

 chaser who demanded Irish whiskey, something which 

 was not of the nature, substance, and quality of Irish 

 whiskey ; and, in the other, that another publican had 

 sold, to the prejudice of a purchaser who demanded 

 Scotch whiskey, something which was not of the 

 nature, substance, and quality of Scotch whiskey. In 

 each case the analyst had certified that what was sold 

 as whiskey " consisted entirely of patent-still, silent 

 or neutral spirit," and was not, therefore, in his 

 opinion, whiskey. 



The learned magistrate ruled that patent-still spirit 

 alone is not whiskey ; and that the produce of a 

 patent still cannot be Irish or Scotch whiskey, although 

 made in Ireland or Scotland. He further held that 



