INDUSTRIES 



increased the sale of the home-made product, 

 and its manufacture was further said to have 

 been treated for some time with much indul- 

 gence by the Government from a notion that 

 the milder article might gradually lead to a 

 mitigation of intemperance.' Pennant, de- 

 scribing Messrs. Beaufoy's works about the 

 beginning of the nineteenth century, thus 

 speaks of the consumption of British wines 

 at this date : — 



It has been estimated that one half of the port 

 and five sixths of the white wines consumed in 

 our capital have been the produce of our home 

 vine presses. The product of duty to the State 

 from a single house in one year from July 5th 1785 

 to July 5th 1786 was not less than ^^7363 ()s. ^\d. 

 The genial banks of the Thames opposite to 

 our Capital yield almost every species of white 

 wine ; and by a wondrous magic, Messrs. Beau- 

 foy pour forth the materials for the rich Fronti- 

 niac to the more elegant tables ; the Madeira, the 

 Calcavella, and the Lisbon into every part of the 

 Kingdom. 



Pennant paid an actual visit to Messrs. 

 Beaufoy's works, and is rhetorical, as is his 

 wont, over the extent of the undertaking and 

 the number and size of the vessels in use : — 



The boasted tun of Heidelberg does not sur- 

 pass them. On first entering the yard two rise 

 before you covered at the top with a thatched 

 dome ; between them is a circular turret includ- 

 ing a winding staircase which brings you to their 

 summits which are about twenty-four feet in dia- 

 meter. One of these conservatories is full of 

 sweet wine and contains 58,109 gallons, or 1,815 

 barrels of Winchester measure. Its superb associ- 

 ate is fiill of vinegar to the amount of 56,799 

 gallons or 1,744 barrels of the same standard as 

 the former. . . . Besides these is an avenue of 

 lesser vessels, which hold from 32,500 to 16,974 

 gallons each. After quitting this Brobdignagian 

 scene we pass to the acres covered with common 

 barrels.* 



The building of Waterloo Bridge, or the 

 Strand Bridge as it was originally intended to 

 be called, the Act for which was passed in 

 1808, determined the removal of Messrs. 

 Beaufoy's premises from Cuper's Gardens to 

 their present site in South Lambeth. The 

 value of their lease, which was short, and 

 the loss incurred by the removal of the works 

 and in establishing new ones, were estimated 

 by a jury at about ^^36,000.^ The present 



» Brayley and Britton, Hist. ofSurr. v. App. 24. 

 ^ Pennant, Some Account of London, etc. (n.d.), i. 



30, 31- 



^ Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. iii. App. 

 xli. Elsewhere these writers state that the rent 

 paid by Messrs. Beaufoy to Jesus College for the 



premises cover about 5 acres of ground, and 

 occupy the site of Caron House built by Sir 

 Noel de Caron, Dutch Ambassador to Eng- 

 land for twenty-eight years in the reigns of 

 Elizabeth and James I.* 



The premises include, besides the malt- 

 stores and the large buildings necessary for 

 the various operations in the manufacture of 

 vinegar, British wines and mineral waters, 

 the large warehouses and cellars in the foreign 

 wines and spirits departments ; the cooperage, 

 where, in addition to the work of cask clean- 

 ing, a large staff is always engaged in break- 

 ing up old and making new casks, and two 

 long ranges of stables for the two classes of 

 horses, heavy and light, respectively employed 

 in the trade. There are also the mansion 

 and gardens formerly occupied by the head 

 of the firm ; the counting-house, with the 

 manager's office ; and above the counting- 

 house the Beaufoy library, founded by Mr. 

 Henry B. H. Beaufoy, F.R.S., who was 

 deeply interested in the question of com- 

 mercial education ; the laboratory under the 

 direction of an eminent chemist, and fitted 

 up with every modern scientific appliance 

 needed for the analysis of all materials used 

 on the premises and for the constant experi- 

 ments required to maintain the standard of 

 excellence in the quality of the articles pro- 

 duced ; the loading shed fitted up with steam 

 cranes ; the shipping office and the mess- 

 rooms of the staff, where provision is made 

 for the comfort of the employes. It is a 

 happy proof of the harmony existing here in 

 the arrangements between masters and men 

 that, although more than two hundred hands 

 are employed, no labour disputes have ever 

 sounded a note of discord in the factory. 



The derivation of the word vinegar (sour 

 wine) sufficiently indicates the principle upon 

 which it was formerly made. But in malt 

 vinegar as it is now made there is not a 

 single trace of the vinous element. The 

 process of its manufacture at Messrs. Beau- 

 foy's, as in all manufactories of malt vinegar, 

 resembles in its first stages that of the manu- 

 facture of beer and spirits, and consists in the 

 mashing of the crushed malt or grist with a 

 certain quantity of hot water, and the drain- 

 ing off of the liquor or wort through a re- 

 frigerator into the fermenting tuns. When 

 the fermentation process is complete, and all 

 the saccharine element of the wort has been 

 converted into alcohol, it is known as ' gyle,' 

 and is stored ready to be passed into the aceti- 



old site at Cuper's Gardens was about ^^1,200 

 {Hist, of Surr. iii. 481). 



* Allen, Hist, of Lambeth, 396. 



399 



