IMPOETANT EXCISE PROSECUTION AT WOLVERHAMPTON. 
91 
at 27s. a gallon as an alcoholic beverage. He contended that it was meant for and sold 
as a medicine, and as nothing else, and he further contended that his client was perfectly 
right in the use of all the ingredients which this essence contained. Now the Act under 
which these proceedings had been taken, made it penal for any person to sell methylated 
spirits without a licence ; and by another section it was enacted that if any person should 
colour or prepare any methylated spirit with intent to fit such spirit for use as a beverage, 
he should be deemed guilty of an offence, and forfeit, on conviction, the sum of <£100. 
Then, in order that there might be no mistake as to what the intentions of the Inland 
Eevenue were on the subject, he would read a letter which had been received by Alfred 
Bird, of Birmingham, from the Inland .Eevenue Office in answer to a communication 
which he had written to them. Mr. Bird’s letter was to the effect (dated 1863) that 
having seen a list of pharmaceutical tinctures and medicines, all made of unduty-paid 
methylated spirits, he wished to know if this was allowed, or whether it was necessary 
to take out a methylated spirit licence, when such spirit was not sold alone but used in 
pharmaceutical tinctures, etc. In reply, the letter from the Inland Eevenue Office stated 
that the Board did not object to the manufacture and sale of any strictly pharmaceutical 
preparation, made with methylated spirits, so long as such preparations were used for 
medical purposes only, and not so made and sold as a cover for use as a beverage. 
Mr. Spooner : Has the attention of the authorities at Somerset House been called to 
this letter, Mr. Marshall, before taking these proceedings ? 
Mr. Marshall said that the permission given by that letter was only meant to extend 
to the preparation of medicines recognized by the Pharmacopoeia, whereas, under the 
name of Indian brandee and Indian whiskee, it was prepared and sold for dram-drinking 
purposes all over the country. The Indian essence sold by the defendant was not con¬ 
sidered as a medicine ; the Commissioners regarded it in the same light as those sold for 
dram-drinking purposes. 
Mr. Motteram denied this: He denied that there was any identity between Indian 
brandee and his client’s Indian essence, and said he would prove in evidence that not a 
drop of methylated spirit, pure, was used in its preparation; but methylated nitrous 
ether was used, and it was the methylated spirit contained in this that the chemists of 
Somerset House found by their analysis. They had stated that they could not find sweet 
nitre, but he would call Dr. Hill, a gentleman who for fifteen or sixteen years had been 
a professor and teacher of chemistry, and who had earned for himself a reputation suffi¬ 
cient to be elected medical officer and analyst for the borough of Birmingham, and he 
would prove that the mixture contained sweet spirits of nitre, which, as they had been 
told, contained methylated spirits, and that was what he (Mr. Motteram) meant at the 
outset of the case, when he said that he would admit that methylated spirits were to be 
found in the essence. Then as to the question whether this methylated spirit was gene¬ 
rally used in the making up of medicines: the documents which he had handed in to 
the Bench contained the list of thirty-six tinctures, etc., required to be tendered for to 
the South Staffordshire Hospital, showed that methylated spirit was frequently used. If, 
then, an institution like the South Staffordshire Hospital could use this spirit, why not 
the poor be able to go to Mr. Eeade, and buy it in such medicines and tinctures as they 
might need for their relief ? But in point of fact Mr. Eeade did not use the pure methy¬ 
lated spirit in making up this essence, and he would call ,the defendant’s assistant, who 
would swear positively that no pure methylated spirit was ever used in the essence ; and, 
if he did this, he should consider that he had proved sufficient to show that the case must 
be dismissed. 
Dr. Hill, Professor of Chemistry and Public Analyst for the Borough of Birmingham, 
was then sworn: He said that he was applied to by Mr. Eeade to analyse the “ Indian 
Essence.” He received four samples of the essence. One was a bottle which had been 
purchased at the shop of a Mr. Cottis; the other three were a bottle which were com¬ 
pounded at Mr. Eeade’s, in his presence; a portion of a bottle which came through the 
excise ; and a portion of methylated nitre which he saw put into the essence that was 
compounded in his presence. There was no pure methylated spirit put into the essence 
he saw compounded. He took four ounces and distilled it, for the purpose of extracting 
the spirit and nitrous ether, and found it to contain nitrous ether with methylated spirit 
and chloroform. The nitrous ether was the sweet spirits of nitre. The methylated spirit 
was an essential element of the nitrous ether. Upon analysing the nitrous ether he 
found methylated spirits contained in it. He found the presence of sweet spirits of nitre 
