y will soon experience it, my labour will be thankfully received
and acknowledged.

Discoveries and Improvements ought not to be concealed; the public
good calls loudly for them; but then, in return for the great
advantage the public receives from them, the author of any such
discovery may with the greatest justice claim an adequate reward.

PREFACE

The following Receipts and Directions are not collected from books,
nor interspersed with old women's nostrums; but they are, in very
truth, the result of my own LONG EXPERIENCE in trade, founded on
chemical principles, which are principles of never-erring nature.

Perhaps I had never thought of this Method of communicating my little
knowledge, had it not been for many gentlemen in the counties of
_Gloucester, Hereford, Worcester_, &c. for whom I have done a great
deal of business, in the cyder-way particularly; and who have often
express'd their desire of seeing my directions for the management of
cyders, &c. made public.

And no doubt such a thing was wanting; for it's hardly credible how
much liquors of almost every kind is spoiled by mismanagement. Few
people know the nature of fermentation, without which no vinous spirit
can be produced; nor any liquor be rendered fine and potible.

Fermentation separates the particles of bodies, and from liquids
throws off the gross parts from the finer, which, without it, could
not be effected. There is what is called a _fret_, which is only a
partial fermentation, that nature is strong enough in some liquors to
bring on, without the assistance of art; but this _fret_, or partial
fermentation, is never strong enough to discharge the liquor of its
foul parts; and if they should ever happen to subside, the least
alteration in weather, as well as a hundred other accidents, will
occasion their commixing, and render the liquor almost, or altogether
as foul as ever; to prevent which we call in the assistance of art,
and which our method will effectually prevent.

In brewing beer, yest is apply'd to it, in order to ferment it,
without which it would never be beer. This opens the body of the
liquor, and renders it spirity and fine.

The reason that cyder is not often fine, is owing to its not being
fermented. After it is got into the hogshead, the generality of people
think they have acquitted themselves very well, and done all the
necessary business, except racking it. But I can assure them, the more
any liquor is rack'd,