Posthumous Work of the late Col. Mark Beaufoy. 345 
ther, a brewer ; and we shall explain in a note the respectable na- 
ture of this trade, as it exists in the city of London.* 
Opinions of Col. Beaufoy’s work by very able judges. ‘The first 
letter is from one of our best engineers, and was directed to the per- 
son from-whom he had received the work of Col. Beaufoy for ex- 
amination. 
TO 
Boston, February 18, 1835. 
Dear Sir—I have examined, with great satisfaction, the splendid 
work of Col. Beaufoy, published and presented to the Academy, by 
his son Henry Beaufoy, Esq. 
The experiments detailed in this work are amongst the most im- 
portant that were ever made in the subject to which they relate. 
The only account of them, which has heretofore existed, in the vol- 
ume of the Society for the Encouragement of Naval Architecture, 
is not to be found in any library in this vicinity, and the publication 
of the work of Col. Beaufoy, which is much more full than the So- 
* The respectability of many commercial persons in London, is universally ac- 
knowledged throughout Europe and the U. States; but it is not so generally 
known that large wholesale brewers stand among the foremost of these characters. 
The reason is evident. ‘The brewing trade in London, when on a large scale, re- 
quires a very enormous capital, and yet the chiefs in a brewing house are under 
no necessity of watching the details of the business; these details being simple and 
purely mechanical, and alloted to the care of subaltern persons. In proof of the 
respect in which some of the chiefs of these establishments are held, we have to 
observe (to refer to no other examples) that Messrs. Whitbread (father and son) 
were both brewers, and both members of parliament; and that the younger Mr. 
Whitbread was married toa sister of Earl Grey, who became premier of England, 
and that Mr. Whitbread, jun. was of some influence with his party in the House 
of Commons. To go no farther: the late Mrs. Thrale, the well known friend of 
Dr. Johnson, was the wife of a great brewer; and it is believed that it was on the 
floor of one of Mr. Thrale’s great brewing vessels, it was said that a hundred 
persons could be seated. Another of those great establishments had a cellar 
which penetrated into the earth two stories deep, in order to receive within its walls 
a mass of beer to ripen during a whole season; and George III, king of England, 
at the period when this cellar was emply, descended to its bottom by a stone stair 
case, confined by aniron railing. Independent of the large and costly premises of 
the great brewers, with their carts and horses, and their utensils, the proprietors of 
these great establishments found it expedient to have at their command (either by 
purchase or lease) public houses, the tenants of which sell in them, none but the 
beer of their landlords. In short, great capitals, great gains, and a perfect inde- 
pendence as to attention to the details of the business, make this an eligible species 
of establishment among persons of great capital, who have no objection to appear 
ym commercia) concerns in a commercial country. 
Vou. XX VIII.—No. 2. 44 
4 
ae Sone NS! 
