gallons of
water, or thereabouts: 100lbs. of grain contain only 16lbs. of dry sweet
matter: therefore, as the 100 gallons of vinous liquor weigh 800lbs. the
16lbs. of sugar form only its fiftieth part.

Thence is seen how inferior the proportions of the whiskey distiller are
to those of the brewer, and how far they are from good theory. But the
brewer aims only at producing a sort of wine, and succeeds; while, the
distiller wants to make spirit, and only obtains it in the manner the
most expensive, and opposed to his own interest.

CHAPTER VI

DEFECTS IN THE USUAL METHOD OF MAKING WHISKEY.

1st. The most hurtful of all for the interests of the distillers, is
undoubtedly the weakness of the vinous liquor. We have seen that the
proportion of spirit is in a ratio to the richness of the fermenting
liquor; that Lavoisier, by putting one-fifth of the mass of dry sugar,
obtained twice as much spirit as the rum distiller, who puts in the same
quantity, but drowns it in water. From those principles, which are not
contested, the distiller, whose vinous liquor contains only one-fiftieth
part of sweet matter, obtains the less spirit, and loses as much of it
as he gets.

2dly. Another defect is joined to this: bodies are dissolved by reason
of their affinity with the dissolving principle; the mucilaginous
substance is as soluble in water as the saccharine substance. A mass of
100 gallons of water having only 16lbs. of sugar to dissolve, exerts
it's dissolving powers upon the mucilaginous part which abounds in
grains, and dissolves a great quantity of it. There results from that
mixture, a fermentation partaking of the spirit and the acid, and if the
temperature of the atmosphere is moderate, the acid invades the spirit,
which is one of its principles: nothing remains but vinegar, and the
hopes of the distiller are deceived.

Some distillers have been induced, by the smallness of their products,
to put in their stills, not only the fluid of the liquor, but the flour
itself. Hence result two important defects. 1st. The solid matter
precipitates itself to the bottom of the still, where it burns, and
gives a very bad taste to the whiskey. In order to remedy this
inconvenience, it has been imagined to stir the flour incessantly, by
means of a chain dragged at the bottom of the still, and put in motion
by an axis passing through the cap, and turned by a workman until the
ebullition takes place. This axis, however well fitt