588. ADDITIONAL NOTES.
fpirit may fome time or other be economically procured from the ve- getables of this climate, as Maroraff extraéted it from the beet-root, and from potatoes. For the ftrencth of common ale, which is pro- duced from the fugar contained in malt, is faid to be about the fame as that of fome domeftic wines, which owe their fpirit to prepared fugar. And as in the former a bufhel or ftrike of malt is ufed to about fix gallons of water, and in the latter about twenty pounds of fugar to fix gallons of water, it follows, that one firike of malt con-
tains about twenty pounds of fugar; which if an eafÿ method of
cleaning it from the mucilage and from the eflential oil of the feed could be difcovered, it may fome time be manufatured at home cheaper, than it can be procured from abroad.
We may add, as all fugar is the fame, and all fpirit is the fame, from whatever plant they are procured; that the flavours of wines differ from each other folely in the effential oil, which they contain, or the quantity of acidity, or of fugar not yet fermented; and that in refpe& to wholefomenefs wines only differ from each other in their ftgength" or quantity of fpirit, unlefs where fome noxious material has been ufed to fine theim, or to countera@ their tendency to the acetous fermentation, as lead has been employed in fome of the cy- ders of our country, and in fome of the white wines of France, to correct their acidity; and it is faid that arfenic is occafonally em- ployed for the purpofe of fining white wines.
The injurious methods of fining wines, and of ftopping their ten- dency to acidity having been mentioned, the innocuous ones ought to be fubjoined; for the former it has been propofed to filter muddy wine through fine fand laid on a fieve; but this Ï am told does not
fucceed, as the mucilage of the foul wine foon fils up the interftices.
of the grain of fands; but that an efficacious method is to fhower the fine fand on the wine through a fieve; which as it pañfes down by its own weight will carry the mucilaginous mud of the wine along with it, And laftly, if fome colouring particles cannot thus be
made