AGEICULTUKAL ALCOHOL IN GERMANY. 19 



waste products on the farm. Such a use of small stills is regarded 

 as financially impracticable even in countries like France and Ger- 

 many, where the peasants have long since learned to live most eco- 

 nomically and do not allow anything to go to waste. 



There are, however, a number of small stills in Germany — ^large 

 when compared with those just mentioned, but small when compared 

 with the smallest distillery regarded as representing the minimum 

 practical efficiency — which utilize potatoes and cereals for the pro- 

 duction of alcohol as such and are maintained in large part for the 

 purpose of supplying spent waste as forage for cows. 



Several of these distilleries are still found in southern Germany. 

 With the abolition of bondage during the early part of the nineteenth 

 century, many of the peasants became small individual farmers. In 

 parts of Bavaria, for example, the division of the larger tracts, both 

 municipal and private, into diminutive farms resulted in the decima- 

 tion of cattle because each farmer desired to cultivate as much of his 

 land as possible. The result was that the land, no longer properly 

 fertilized with stable manure, became more or less exhausted. To 

 counteract this tendency, the cultivation of potatoes was stimulated 

 by the installation of the so-called Pistorius distilling apparatus. 

 Of these stills, mounted near the middle of the nineteenth century, 

 some may yet be seen in operation. However, they are rapidly giving 

 way to larger continuous stills and to a more rational mode of oper- 

 ation through cooperative means. In the village of Perlach, near 

 Munich, where about 15 years ago there were 35 of these stills, but 4 

 were in operation at the beginning of the season 1907-8, and one of 

 these was abandoned in December, 1907, the owner having purchased 

 an interest in the local cooperative distillery. 



Not only are these distilleries hampered in their operation because 

 of their small size, but they are not continuous apparatus and hence 

 involve considerable loss of time in charging (which is done with the 

 aid of a bucket instead of a pump) and heating. Moreover, the men 

 who operate these stills, although they may have had years of ex- 

 perience, have not, as a rule, a technical training. Naturally they 

 can not undertake the production of the necessary yeast; hence, this 

 must be oi^tained from the neai'cst brewery. This involves not only 

 a loss of time, but it frequently means poor yeast and consequently 

 poor fcirncnlation. Even if the farmer ]>e a man of somewhat greater 

 intelligence than his distiller, he does not conqMite profit and loss 

 and either he is satisfied to receive a certain amount of food daily 

 for his stock and to receive money at I'cgular intci-vals for his alcohol, 

 or he listens to the agricultural lectui-es and abandons individual 

 operation. The latter course, as already indicated, has become so 

 common of hilc t\\:\\ tlicro now rciniiin l)ii( icliitivch' IVw of these 



