tm THE COTTAGE GARDENER AND COUNTRY 
grub. It feeds upon everything vegetable, and is always 
found near the surface. The most effectual plan is to catch 
it and kill it. The red underwing moth, that is considered 
so pretty by some as it flits in the summer through the 
garden, settles very frequently on the ground to drop an 
egg that is hatched into this grub. Its appetite is most 
voracious, and in a scarcity of more dainty fare it will feed 
upon a fresh plantation of Cabbages. We are also generally 
pestered at this season with slugs and earwigs. The 
destruction of the slugs is easily effected by placing small 
tiles on the beds, supported at the corners by pebbles, and 
fresh bran underneath; and the earwigs by placing small 
bundles of straight sticks in the paths on each side of the 
beds, to be untied and examined every morning. Auriculas to 
be guarded from wet, which is highly detrimental to them at 
this season of the year. Like the greenhouse and many 
other sorts of plants, as the days shorten and the winter 
approaches, by gradually withholding water and by free 
exposure in favourable weather they would be the better 
prepared for a comparatively dormant state. 
The Greenhouse should be in readiness for receiving the 
plants when a change in the weather is apparent towards 
the middle or end of the month. When removing them to 
their winter quarters is the most favourable time to wash 
the pots clean, to examine the drainage if the surface of the 
pot appears sodden, to remove any moss or weeds, to surface 
them if necessary with a little fresh soil, and, if any worm- I 
casts appear on the surface, by turning the ball of soil 
carefully out of the pot the worms are generally found 
the first or second time unless it is a very large pot, 
when the application of lime water in a clear state will 
banish or destroy them. As the dewy nights of autumn are 
very beneficial to plants the housing of them should be 
postponed as long as the weather will permit; but as it is 
especially necessary to guard against the possibility of the 
plants being exposed to heavy and cold rains, by which the 
soil would become saturated, it should be the desire to pro¬ 
duce a gradual approach to dormancy in root and branch, 
which can be best attained by having them under con¬ 
trol in the greenhouse, where, by pulling down the lights, or 
by any other means the most effectual for the free admission 
of air in fine weather, they could be easily protected from 
the injurious effects of heavy autumn rains. When arrang¬ 
ing them in the greenhouse it is advisable to give sufficient 
space for the air to circulate freely around each plant, and 
to thin out any crowded shoots to ripen the wood. Japan 
Lilies, Gladioli, and such plants when done blooming to be 
removed to some warm, open situation at the foot of a south ! 
wall or fence to ripen their growth, to be watered moderately ; 
till the tops decay, when they may be laid on their sides till j 
potting time. Cinerarias to be shifted in good time for early ! 
flowering, and the shifting of Chinese Primroses, Calceolarias, 
Humeas, and other such seedling plants to be continued for 
next season’s blooming. The pits and frames should now | 
be furnished with what bulbs may be required for forcing, 
with the Anne Boleyn, Paddington, and white Pinks, and j 
Neapolitan and Russian Violets. Mignonette to be thinned 
out in good time and another sowing made, and Calceolarias 
to be divided and potted into sixty-sized pots, and placed in 
cinder ashes near the glass. The propagation of scarlet 
Geraniums, Verbenas, Heliotropes, Calceolarias, and all other 
such bedding - out plants must be now prosecuted with 
despatch. Verbenas strike freely in pans of wet sand. About 
the middle of the month the Chinese, Noisette, and Bourbon 
Rose cuttings strike freely in sandy soil in a close frame 
with a gentle bottom heat.— William Keane. 
NEW BOOKS. 
The Adulteration of our Daily Food.* —Everybody 
wishes to obtain the most of the best possible article for the 
least possible money, and this is a chief cause of adultera¬ 
tion. Unfortunately those who are willing to p<ay a fair 
price are involved in the consequences incident to the pre¬ 
vailing cry for that impossible combination, a very good 
and very cheap article. This cry, however, is not the only 
* A Key to the Adulteration of our Daily Food. Compiled by W. 
Dalton. London: E. Marlborough and Co. 
GENTLEMAN’S COMPANION, August 25, 1857. 
cause of adulteration, for, unfortunately, some things of 
daily consumption are liable to a heavy excise or custom¬ 
house duty, and the seller of these things obtains a profit 
just in proportion as he is able to increase their weight or 
measure by mixing with them things which are cheaper and 
liable to no duty. 
To prevent such fraudulent adulterations the legislature 
has imposed heavy penalties upon the adulterators. For 
instance, by a statute passed in the fifth year of her present 
Majesty’s reign, T300 is the mulct for adulterating tobacco 
and snuif; and a further penalty of <£200 upon any manu¬ 
facturer of these having the following ingredients in his 
possession, gives a startling catalogue of what fumes the 
present generation are in the habit of daily inhaling either 
into their mouths or noses:—“ Sugar, treacle, honey, com- 
mings of malt, roasted grain, chicory, lime, umber, ochre, 
seaweed, ground wood, moss, weeds, leaves,” &c. Beer, tea, 
coffee, bread, and many other articles are sought to be 
similarly preserved from adulteration, but with how little 
success is proved by the mass of unimpeachable evidence 
condensed into Mr. Dalton’s useful little volume. We re¬ 
commend our readers to purchase it, for it is a comfort to 
know what one is really doing when one is innocently eating 
one’s bread and drinking one’s wine. An extract of what 
Mr. Dalton says about the latter will be a good example of 
his book. 
“ Although the reader may not be surprised to find that 
wine is adulterated, he will be interested at the modus 
operandi. Dr. Taylor says, ‘ I have had some experience in 
the examination of port wines on the part of the London 
Dock Company. It appears that port wine is sometimes 
manufactured out of bad clarets and bad Italian red wines, 
bought at 7d. a gallon; and then, by the addition of a 
mixture of geropiga, dried extract of elderberry juice, 
Lisbon grapes, brown sugar, brandy, bitter almonds, and 
logwood, a mixture is made up which is called London port. 
The wine I am speaking of was the subject of a trial at the 
Exchequer Sittings in Guildhall last summer, in a case in 
which the London Dock Company had been subject to very 
great frauds in consequence of the substitution of good 
port wine for this bad material. That stuff was bought at 
7d. a gallon, and this wine ivas afterwards sold at from 12s. 
to 15s. a gallon, and the plaintiff in that case said he had a 
chemical mixture by which he could turn sour claret into 
very full-bodied port, and this was the substance which was 
supposed to be used. 
“ ‘ I have detected brown sugar, logwood, and brandy in 
English port. I am taking this as a matter of evidence, 
which w r as given upon the trial; it came out upon the trial 
what was the nature of this mixture. Geropiga is imported 
from Portugal as well as made in this country, and some 
of it is added to the -wine even in Portugal. Geropiga or 
brandy is added to almost all the wine of Oporto. Cheap 
Italian wine does not pay duty as wine. It is what they call 
damaged wine, which the Dock Company, after it has been 
kept a certain time, sell at a low rate to make vinegar. It 
came out in this case that publicans bought it at 7d. a gallon, 
made the mixture I have referred to, and sold it at from 12s. 
to 15s. a gallon. If a person were ordered to drink port 
wine medicinally this mixture would not produce any of the 
effects intended by his medical adviser, but would be an 
astringent tonic mixture, and not good port wine.’ 
“ ‘ 1 have occasionally analysed wine,’ says Mr. W. Bastick, 
an analytical chemist, ‘ and have come to the conclusion 
that many which are sold are manufactured articles. I have 
a recipe which will show the Committee more distinctly 
what I mean by manufactured articles. It is said to be a 
recipe for making an imitation of good port wine:—Good 
cider, 45 gallons ; brandy, 0 gallons; good port, 8 gallons; 
ripe sloes, 2 gallons; stew them in 2 gallons of water, press 
ofi the liquor, and add, if the colour is not strong enough, 
tincture of red sanders; in a few days this wine may be 
bottled; add to each bottle a tea-spoonful of powdered 
catechu, mixing it, when it will very soon produce a fine 
crusted appearance. The bottles being packed on their 
sides as usual, soak the ends of the corks in a strong de¬ 
coction of Brazil wood with alum, which, along with the 
crust, will give it the appearance of age. 
“ ‘ I believe that the person in whose book this receipt 
was found was in,the habit of making port wine and vend- 
