WEST INDIES. 
CHAP. II.] 
4 f 
The advantage of clarifying the liquor in this 
manner, instead of forcing an immediate ebullition, 
as practised formerly, is visible to the most inatten¬ 
tive observer. The labour which it saves in scum¬ 
ming is wonderful. Neither can scumming pro¬ 
perly cleanse the subject; for when the liquor 
boils violently, the whole body of it circulates with 
such rapidity, as to carry down again the very im¬ 
purities that had come up to the surface, and with a 
less violent heat would have staid there. 
In the grand or evaporating copper, which should 
be large enough to receive the net contents of one 
of the clarifiers, the liquor is suffered to boil; and as 
the scum rises, it is continually taken off by large 
scummers, until the liquor grows finer and some¬ 
what thicker. This labour is continued until, from 
the scumming and evaporation, the subject is suf¬ 
ficiently reduced in quantity to be contained in the 
next or second copper, into which it is then laded. 
The liquor is now nearly of the colour of Madeira 
wine. In the second copper the boiling and scum¬ 
ming are continued; and if the subject is not so 
clean as expected, lime-water is thrown into it. 
This addition is intended, not merely to give more 
temper, but also to dilute the liquor, which some¬ 
times thickens too fast to permit the feculencies to 
run together and rise in the scum. Liquor is said 
to have a good appearance in the second copper, 
Sainthill, and an exclusive patent, to secure his claim, was granted to 
him in 1778 by an act of the assembly. 
