that many wholesale brewers, as well as retail dealers, stand very conspicuous among those offenders. But the reader will like wise notice, that there are no convictions, in any instance, against any of the eleven great London porter brewers for any illegal practice. The great London brewers, it appears, believe that the publicans alone adulterate the beer. That many of the latter have been convicted of this fraud, the Report of the Board of Excise amply shews. See p. 176.

"The following statement relating to this subject, we transcribe from a Parlia mentary document.

"Mr Perkins, being asked whether he believed that any of the inferior brewers adulterated beer, answered, I am satisfied there are some instances of that.'

“Question. Do you believe publicans do ?' Answer. I believe they do.' Q. To a great extent ?' A. Yes.' Q. Do you believe they adulterate the beer you sell them ?' A. I am satisfied there are some instances of that.'-Mr J. Martineau being asked the following

"Question. In your judgment is any of the beer of the metropolis, as retailed to the publican, mixed with any deleterious ingredients ?'

Answer. In retailing beer, in some instances, it has been.'

** Question. By whom, in your opinion, has that been done?'

"Answer." In that case by the publicans who vend it.'

"On this point, it is but fair to the mi

nor brewers, to record also the answers of

some officers of the revenue, when they were asked, whether they considered it more difficult to detect nefarious practices in large

breweries than in small ones?

"Mr J. Rogers being thus questioned in the committee of the House of Commons, • Supposing the large brewers to use deleterious or any illegal ingredients to such an amount as could be of any importance to their concerns, do you think it would, or would not, be more easy to detect it in those large breweries than in small ones?" his answer was, more difficult to detect it in the large ones :' and witness being asked to state the reason why, answered, Their premises are so much larger, and there is so much more strength, that a cart load or two is got rid of in a minute or two.' Witness had known, in five minutes, twenty barrels of molasses got rid of as soon as the door was shut.'

"Another witness, W. Wells, an exciseofficer, in describing the contrivances used to prevent detection, stated, that at a brewer's at Westham, the adulterating substances was not kept on the premises, but in the brewer's house; not the principal, but the working brewer's; it not being considered, when there, as liable to seizure: the brewer had a very large jacket made expressly for that purpose, with very large

pockets; and on brewing mornings, he would take his pockets full of the different ingredients. Witness supposed that such a man's jacket, similar to what he had described, would convey quite sufficient for any brewery in England, as to cocculus indicus.'

"That it may be more difficult for the officers of the Excise to detect fraudulent practices in large breweries than in small ones, may be true to a certain extent; but what eminent London porter brewer would stake his reputation on the chance of so paltry a gain, in which he would inevitably be at the mercy of his own man? The eleven great porter brewers of this metropolis are persons of so high respectability, that there is no ground for the slightest suspicion that they would attempt any illegal practices, which they were aware could not possibly escape detection in their extensive establishments. And let it be remembered, that none of them have been detected for any unlawful practices, with regard to the processes of their manufacture, or the adulteration of their beer."

The following observations on the adulteration of rum and brandy are by no means applicable to "John Hamilton's best," which inspires the flash coves of the Trongate with too much wit not to be genuine. We are convinced, nevertheless, that it contains something singular in its composition, and possesses an inherent stimulus to trotting. When drinking it t'other day at a friend's house, who lately imported a few dozens of it from Glasgow, we detected ourself more than once instinctively trotting two military gentlemen, who sat on our right and left, on the subject of their campaigns. This, however, must be the subject of a separate dis

sertation.

"Brandy and rum is also frequently sophisticated with British molasses, or sugarspirit, coloured with burnt sugar.

"The flavour which characterises French brandy, and which is owing to a small portion of a peculiar essential oil contained in it, is imitated by distilling British molasses spirit over wine lees; but the spirit, prior to being distilled over wine lees, is previously deprived, in part, of its peculiar disagreeable flavour, by rectification over freshburnt charcoal and quicklime. Other brandy-merchants employ a spirit obtained from raisin wine, which is suffered to pass into an incipient ascescency. The spirit thus procured partakes strongly of the flavour which is characteristic to foreign brandy.

"Oak saw-dust, and a spirituous tincture of raisin stones, are likewise used to impart to new brandy and rum a ripe taste, resem

"Add also 10 handfuls of oak saw-dust; and give it complexion with burnt sugar.”

Mr Accum gives us a long dissertation on counterfeit tea, and another on spurious coffee; but as these are impositions by which we are little affected, we shall not allow them to detain us. The leaves of the sloe-thorn are substituted for the former, and roasted horse beans for the latter. These frauds, it appears, are carried to a very great extent.

We believe we have not yet noticed the frauds of the cheesemonger, we now beg, therefore, to introduce that gentleman to the notice of our read

ers.

"As a striking example of the extent to which adulterated articles of food may be unconsciously diffused, and of the consequent difficulty of detecting the real fabricators of them, it may not be uninteresting to relate to your readers the various steps by which the fraud of a poisonous adulteration of cheese was traced to its source.'

"Your readers ought here to be told, that several instances are on record, that Gloucester and other cheeses have been found contaminated with red lead, and that this contamination has produced serious consequences. In the instance now alluded to, and probably in all other cases, the deleterious mixture had been caused ignorantly, by the adulteration of the anotto employed for colouring the cheese. This substance, in the instance I shall relate, was found to contain a portion of red lead; a species of adulteration which subsequent experiments have shewn to be by no means uncommon. Before I proceed further to trace this fraud to its source, I shall briefly relate the circumstance which gave rise to its detection.'

"A gentleman, who had occasion to reside for some time in a city in the West of England, was one night seized with a

distressing but indescribable pain in the region of the abdomen and of the stomach, accompanied with a feeling of tension, which occasioned much restlessness, anxiety, and repugnance to food. He began to apprehend the access of an inflammatory disorder; but in twenty-four hours the symptoms entirely subsided. In four days afterwards he experienced an attack precisely similar; and he then recollected, that having, on both occasions, arrived from the country late in the evening, he had ordered a plate of toasted Gloucester cheese, of which he had partaken heartily; a dish which, when at home, regularly served him for supper. He attributed his illness to the cheese. The circumstance was mentioned to the mistress of the inn, who expressed great surprise, as the cheese in question was not purchased from a country dealer, but from a highly respectable shop in London. He, therefore, ascribed the before-mentioned effects to some peculiarity in his constitution. A few days afterwards he partook of the same cheese; and he had scarcely retired to rest, when a most violent colic seized him, which lasted the whole night and part of the ensuing day. The cook was now directed henceforth not to serve up any toasted cheese, and he never again experi enced these distressing symptoms. Whilst this matter was a subject of conversation in the house, a servant-maid mentioned that a kitten had been violently sick after having eaten the rind cut off from the cheese prepared for the gentleman's supper. The landlady, the cheese to be examined by a chemist in in consequence of this statement, ordered the vicinity, who returned for answer, that the cheese was contaminated with lead! So unexpected an answer arrested general attention, and more particularly as the suspected cheese had been served up for several other customers.'

66 6

Application was therefore made by the London dealer to the farmer who manufactured the cheese; he declared that he had bought the anotto of a mercantile traveller, who had supplied him and his neighbours for years with that commodity, without giving occasion to a single complaint. On subsequent inquiries, through a circuitous channel, unnecessary to be detailed here at length, on the part of the manufacturer of the cheese, it was found, that as the sup plies of anotto had been defective and of inferior quality, recourse had been had to the expedient of colouring the commodity with vermilion. Even this admixture could not be considered deleterious. But on further application being made to the druggist who sold the article, the answer was, that the vermilion had been mixed with a portion of red lead; and the deception was held to be perfectly innocent, as frequently practised on the supposition, that the vermilion would be used only as a pigment for housepainting. Thus the druggist sold his ver milion in the regular way of trade, adul.

terated with red lead to increase his profit, without any suspicion of the use to which it would be applied; and the purchaser who adulterated the anotto, presuming that the vermilion was genuine, had no hesitation in heightening the colour of his spurious anotto with so harmless an adjunct. Thus, through the circuitous and diversified ope rations of commerce, a portion of deadly poison may find admission into the necessa ries of life, in a way which can attach no criminality to the parties through whose hands it has successively passed."

We must now draw our extracts to a close; but we can assure our readers, that we have not yet introduced them to one tythe of the poisonous articles in common use, detected by Mr Accum. We shall give the titles of a few to satisfy the curious:-Poisonous confectionary, poisonous pickles, poisonous cayenne pepper, poisonous custards, poisonous anchovy sauce, poisonous lozenges, poisonous lemon acid, pois onous mushrooms, poisonous ketchup, and poisonous soda water! Read this, and wonder how live!

you

While we thus suffer under accumulated miseries brought upon us by the unprincipled avarice and cupidity of others, it is surely incumbent on us not wantonly to increase the catalogue by any negligence or follies of our own. Will it be believed, that in the cookery book, which forms the pre vailing oracle of the kitchens in this part of the island, there is an express injunction to "boil greens with halfpence in order to improve their colour?" That our puddings are frequently seasoned with laurel leaves, and our sweetmeats almost uniformly prepared in copper vessels? Why are we thus compelled to swallow a supererogatory quantity of poison which may so easily be avoided? Why are we eternally insulted at our entertainments with the presence of that villainous decoction of offal, falsely called calfsfoot jelly? And why are we constantly made to run the risk of our lives by participating in custards, trifles, and blancmanges, seasoned by a most deadly poison extracted from

the prunus lauro-cerasus? Verily, while our present detestable system of cookery remains, we may exclaim with the sacred historian, that there is indeed "Death in the Pot."

Yet, after all, when we have drained the bitter draught presented to us by Mr Accum to the bottom, there will still be found a drop of comfort in the goblet. It is certain that the alimentary sophistications detected in his work, have, by no means, become so prevalent in this quarter of the island, as it appears they have done among our neighbours. Scotland is not a soil in which fraud of any kind has ever flourished, and least of all, fraud of so aggravated a nature as to imply not only the total destitution of moral principle, but the utter absence of all human feeling in the perpetrator of it. But if we find some security from imposition in the general character of our population, we may rely with still greater confidence on the well-earned fame of individuals. The potency of Provost Manderson's pills will not readily be doubted by those who admire him as an upright and distinguished magistrate, and still less by those who, like ourselves, can bear testimony, by experience, (alas too frequent) to their efficacy. When revelling amid the luxuries of Bailie Henderson's shop, the very smell of which might create an appetite under the ribs of death, no dismal apprehension need spoil the flavour of our Bologna, or prevent us from washing it down with a bumper of his transcendent Maraschino. What delicacy is there of which we may not freely partake in Mrs Weddell's, Mrs Montgomery's, or Mr Davidson's ?There lurks no poison in the warm, soothing, and delicious jellies of the first, the inimitable mulligatany of the second, or the exquisite patés and unrivalled ices of the third. Uncontaminated by drugs, the porter of the Prestonpans brewery will still maintain the high reputation it has acquir ed; and share, with Bell's ale, an ĥonourable, an extended, and a lucrative

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VOL. VI.

4 A

ful how much of thought, power, invention, and genius, are for ever travelling their cold unworthy rounds between the shelves of circulating libraries, and the tables or pillows of habitual novel-readers. The works of Brown, and of many other writers, scarcely his inferiors, are perused day after day, and year after year, by boys and girls, and persons of all ages, whose minds are incapable of discriminating the nature or merits of the food they devour, without being read once in many years by any one who has either judgment or imagination to understand while he is reading them, or memory to retain the smallest impression of their contents after he has laid them aside; while some fortunate accident not unfrequently elevates, for a considerable length of time, into every thing but the highest order of celebrity and favour, writings of the same species, entirely their inferiors in every quality that ought to command the public approbation. We earnestly recommend these novels of Brown to the attention of our readers. In all of them, but especially in Wieland, they will discern the traces of a very masterly hand. Brown was not indeed a Godwin; but he possessed much, very much, of the same dark, mysterious power of imagination which is displayed in Caleb Williams, St Leon, and Mandeville; much also of the same great author's deep and pathetic knowledge of the human heart; and much of his bold sweeping flood of impassioned eloquence. There are scenes in Wieland which he that has read them and understood them once, can never forget-touches which enter into the very core of the spirit, and leave their glowing traces there for ever behind them. Wild and visionary in his general views of human society, and reasoning and declaiming like a madman whenever the abuses of human power are the subjects on which he enlarges-in his perceptions of the beauty and fitness of all domestic virtues-in his fine sense of the delicacies of love, friendship, and all the tenderness, and all the heroism of individual souls,-he exhibits a strange example of the inconsistency of the human mind, and a signal lesson how easily persons naturally virtuous may, if they indulge in vague bottomless dreamings about things they neither know nor understand, become blind to many of the true interests of their

species, and be the enemies of social peace and happiness, under the mask of universal reformers. The life of this strange man was a restless and unhappy one. The thoughts in which he delighted were all dark and gloomy: and in reading his works, we cannot help pausing every now and then, amidst the stirring and kindling excitements they afford, to reflect of what sleepless midnights of voluntary misery the impression is borne by pages, which few ever turn over, except for the purpose of amusing a few hours of listless or vicious indolence. It is thus that one of his own countrymen has lately spoken of his works :—

"A writer so engrossed with the character of men, and the ways in which they may be influenced; chiefly occupied with the mind, turning every thing into thought, and refining upon it till it almost vanishes might not be expected to give much time to descriptions of outward objects. But in all his tales, he shews great closeness and minuteness of observation. He describes as if he told only what he had seen, in a highly excited state of feeling, and in connection with the events and characters. He discovers every where a strong sense of the presence of objects. Most of his descriptions are simple, and many might appear bald. He knew, perhaps, that some minds could be "awakened by the mere mention of a

waterfall, or of full orchards and corn-fields," or of the peculiar sound of the wind among the pines. We have alluded to the distinctiveness and particularity with which he describes the city visited with pestilence:the dwelling-house, the hospital, the dying, the healed, all appear before our eyes-The imagination has nothing to do but perceive, though it never fails to multiply and enlarge circumstances of horror, and to fasten us to the picture more strongly, by increasing terror and sympathy till mere disgust ceases.

The most formal and protracted description is in Edgar Huntly, of a scene in our western wilderness. We become acquainted with it by following the hero night and day, in a cold, drenching, rain storm, or under the clear sky-through its dark caverns, recesses and woods-along its ridges and the river side. It produces throughout the liveliest sense of danger, and oppresses the spirits with an almost inexplicable sadness. Connected with it are incidents of savage warfare; the disturbed life of the frontier settler; the attack of the half-famished panther; the hero's lonely pursuit of a sleep-walker; and his own adventures when suffering under the same calamity. The question is not, how much of this has happened, or is likely to happen; but, is it felt? Are we, for the time, at the disposal of the writer, and can we never lose the impression that he leaves? Does it appear in its first freshness, when any thing occurs