ee 
ALK. 
[ 
_ or even developing. 
spots as to have the tint of a bluish gray. Its 
leaves are oval, spear-shaped, about two inches 
long and one inch broad, growing irregularly on 
the branches, their upper surface smooth and of 
a shining green, and their under surface possess- 
ing many strong veins which run from the mid- 
rib to the edges. Its flowers are greenish, very 
small, unexpanding, and very unconspicuous ; and 
they are produced in clusters, on every side of 
the branches, at the first and second joints of 
young shoots, and at the end of the shoots of a 
former year. The berries are red while growing, 
and black when ripe; and are very ornamental 
to the plant. The flowering occurs in June, and 
the ripening in September. This plant makes a 
favourable figure in the writings of herbalists, 
but is really of very trifling medicinal value. Its 
berries used often to be sold in the markets of 
London for the berries of buckthorn; but they 
may easily be distinguished by their possessing 
_ only two acini or seeds, while the berries of buck- 
thorn possess four.—The dwarf berry-bearing 
_ alder seldom rises higher than two feet; and 
makes no show in either flowers or berries, the 
former being small, and the latter rarely ripening 
Its branches are of a bluish 
brown colour; and its leaves are nearly circular, 
| andstand on short footstalks, and have many strong 
veins running from their midrib to their border. 
—The American smooth-leaved berry-bearing al- 
der attains the same height as the common berry- 
bearing alder, and differs very little from that 
variety in either leaves, flowers, or fruit.—The 
rough-leaved alpine frangula, or rough-leaved al- 
pine berry-bearing alder, Rhamnus alpinus, attains 
a greater height than any of the varieties of Rham- 
nus frangula, is unarmed with thorns, and has 
doubly-lancinjated and comparatively tough and 
large leaves. A variety of this species, called the 
smooth-leaved alpine berry-bearing alder, has 
smoother leaves and a taller habit than its type. 
All the sorts of frangula are easily propagated 
from seeds, sown in autumn. 
ALDERNEY COW. See Carrur. 
ALE. A well-known beverage, produced by 
the fermentation of hops and malt in an abun- 
dant infusion of water. 
Ale, either in its modern composition or of 
some more simple character, is supposed to have 
been invented by the Egyptians, and to have been 
suggested by the unsuitableness of their very fer- 
tile lands for the cultivation of the grape. Hero- 
dotus, who wrote upwards of four hundred years 
before the Christian era, says that the Egyptians 
used a liquor made from fermented barley. Dion 
Cassius makes allusion to the use of a similar 
liquor by the inhabitants of the sea-board of the 
Adriatic. Tacitus states that the ancient Germans 
drew a liquor from barley or some other grain, 
and so fermented it as to make it resemble wine. 
Pliny mentions that ale, under various names, 
was used by the Egyptians, the Spaniards, and 
all the nations of the west of Europe, and that | 
‘beer was owing to the malt from which they were 
' 109 
this beverage was made even by the inhabitants 
of some vinous countries. Ale was the favourite 
beverage of the Danes and the Anglo-Saxons, and 
a constant drink at their feasts; and while they 
continued in a heathen condition, they believed 
that copious libations of it formed one of the 
principal felicities of their deceased and immortal 
heroes. Ale is named in the laws of King Ina, 
and is recorded to have been used at a royal feast 
in the reign of Edward the Confessor. The grain 
for the manufacture of ale was treated by the an- 
cient Britons and other Celtic nations almost pre- 
cisely as it is treated by modern maltsters and 
brewers ; for, according to the statement of Isi- 
dorus and Orosius, “it was steeped in water, and 
made to germinate, it was then dried and ground, 
and it was afterwards infused in a certain quantity » 
of water, and fermented.” Hops seem to have 
been introduced to the manufacture of ale, by 
the German and the Dutch brewers, about the 
year 1400; but they were prohibited to be used 
in England by a statute of the year 1530, they 
began to be raised in English hop-gardens about 
the year 1552, and they seem to have come into 
general use in England about the year 1600. 
Ale, as is well-known, has, for a long period, 
been used as a beverage by the middle and the 
operative classes of the rural population of the 
greater part of England; and, in consequence, it 
is an object of very considerable economical in- 
terest to the large majority of English farmers. 
Different kinds of ale are brewed, such as pale - 
ale, brown ale, hop ale, herb ale, strong ale, and 
table ale; and various other kinds of malt liquor 
are closely akin in both constitution and mode of 
manufacture to ale, such as small beer, table beer, 
strong beer, and the different sorts of brown stout 
and porter. Pale ale is made from slightly dried 
malt, and is characterized quite as much by its 
viscidity as by its colour. Brown ale is made 
from thoroughly dried or half toasted malt, and 
has a close relation to strong beer or light coloured 
porter. Hop ale contains a very small proportion 
of malt, and is much less alcoholic and consider- 
ably more tonic than the pale and the brown ales. 
Herb ale is any ordinary ale medicated with gen- 
tian root, quassia wood, calamus aromaticus, or 
any other tonic bitter. Strong ale and table ale 
are distinguished rather by their comparative 
proportion of water than by their quality. The 
distinctions amongst ale, beer, and porter, are 
stated as follows by Dr. Thomson :—“ Both ale 
and beer are obtained by fermentation from the 
malt of barley; but they differ from each other 
in several particulars. Ale is light-coloured, 
brisk, and sweetish ; while beer is dark-coloured, 
bitter, and much less brisk. Porter is a species 
of beer, and is what was formerly called strong 
beer. The original difference between ale and 
prepared. Ale malt was dried at a very low heat, 
and consequently was of a pale colour; while : 
beer or porter malt was dried at a higher tem- 
