No adulteration of any article has ever been invented so pernicious
to the health, and at the same time so much practised, as that of
wine with preparations of lead; and as the inventor must have been
acquainted with its destructive effects, he deserves, for making it
known, severer execration than Berthold Schwartz, the supposed inventor
of gunpowder.
The juice of the grape, when expressed, undergoes what is termed
vinous fermentation and so becomes converted into wine, but very
soon, if great care be not taken, it passes into a different kind of
fermentation, called the acetic; its spirit then becomes changed into
an acid, which renders it unfit to be drunk, and of much less utility.
The progress of the fermentation may be stopped by care and attention;
but to bring the liquor back to its former state is impossible.
Ingenuity, however, has invented a fraudulent method of rendering the
acid in spoilt wine imperceptible; so that those who are not judges
are often imposed on, and purchase sweetened vinegar instead of wine.
Were no other articles used for sweetening it than honey or sugar, the
adulterator would deserve no severer punishment than those who sell
pinchbeck for gold; but saccharine juices can be used only when the
liquor begins to turn sour; and even then in very small quantities,
else it would betray the imposition by its sweetish-sour taste, and
hasten that change which it is intended to prevent. A sweetener
therefore, has been invented much surer for the fraudulent dealer, but
infinitely more destructive to the consumer; and those who employ it,
undoubtedly, merit the same punishment as the most infamous poisoners.
Lead and its oxide or carbonate, dissolved in the acid which spoils
wine, give it a saccharine taste not unpleasant, without any new,
or at least perceptible tint, and arrest the progress of the acid
fermentation. The wine, however, occasions, according as it is used in
a great or small quantity, and according to the constitution of the
consumer, a speedy or lingering death, violent colics, obstructions and
other maladies; so that one may justly doubt whether, at present, Mars,
Venus, or Saturn is most destructive to the human race.
The ancients, in my opinion, knew that lead rendered harsh wine
milder, and preserved it from acidity, without being aware that it
was poisonous. It was therefore long used with confidence; and when
its effects were discovered they were not ascribed to the metal, but
to some other cause. When more accurate observation, in modern times,
fully established the noxious property of lead, and when it began to
be dreaded in wine, unprincipled dealers invented an artful method of
employing it, which the law, by the severest punishment, was not able
wholly to prevent.
The Greeks and the Romans were accustomed to boil their wine over a
slow fire, till only a half, third, or fourth part remained, and to mix
it with bad wine in order to improve it. When, by this operation, it
had lost part of its watery particles, and had been mixed with honey
and spices, it acquired several names, such as _mustum_, _mulsum_,
_sapa_, _carenum_, or _caroenum_, _defrutum_[716], &c. Even at present
the same method is pursued with sack, Spanish, Hungarian, and Italian
wines. In Italy, new wine, which has been thus boiled, is put into
flasks, and used for salad and sauces. In Naples it is called _musto
cotto_; but in Florence it still retains the name of _sapa_. Most of
those authors who have described this method of boiling wine expressly
say that leaden or tin vessels must be employed; because the wine, by
these, is rendered more delicious and durable, as well as clearer.
It is, however, certain that must and sour wine by slow boiling, for
according to their directions it should not be boiled quickly, must
dissolve part of these dangerous metals, otherwise the desired effect
could not be produced[717]. Some also were accustomed to add to their
wine, before it was boiled, a certain quantity of sea water, which by
its saline particles would necessarily accelerate the solution[718].
That the acid of wine has the power of dissolving lead was not unknown
to the ancients; for when the Greek and Roman wine-merchants wished to
try whether their wine was spoiled, they immersed in it a plate of
lead[719]. If the colour of the lead was changed, which undoubtedly
would be the case when its surface was corroded, they concluded that
their wine was spoiled. It cannot, however, be said that they were
altogether ignorant of the dangerous effects of solutions of that
metal; for Galen and other physicians often give cautions respecting
white lead. Notwithstanding this, men fell upon the invention of
conveying water for culinary purposes in leaden pipes[720]; and
even at present at London, Amsterdam, Paris, and other places water
is conveyed through lead, and collected in leaden cisterns, though
that practice has, on several occasions, been attended with alarming
consequences[721]. This negligence in modern times makes us not be
surprised when we read that the ancients employed leaden vessels. It
appears, however, that it was not merely through negligence that this
practice prevailed. They were acquainted, and particularly in Pliny’s
time, with various processes used in regard to wine[722]; and among
these was that of boiling it with lime or gypsum[723]; and the ancient
physicians, who had not the assistance of our modern chemistry,
thought it more probable that their wine was rendered noxious by the
addition of these earths[724], than by the vessels in which it was
boiled; and they were the more inclined to this opinion, as they had
instances of the fatal effects produced by the use of them[725]. They
decried them, therefore, so much, that laws were afterwards made by
which they were forbidden to be used, as poisonous and destructive to
the human body.
Wine which has once begun to spoil cannot be perfectly restored by
lime; for it cannot bring back to it the spirituous part which it has
lost, neither can it remove the acid with which it is incorporated;
but it can render it imperceptible to the tongue by uniting with it,
and forming an earthy salt of an almost insipid taste. This method of
improving sour wine is still practised in the island of Zante[726], in
Spain[727], on the coast of Africa[728], and in many other countries.
It is, however, condemned by several physicians and chemists; because
obstructions and other bad effects are to be apprehended from it. Some,
on the contrary, consider it as harmless[729]; and I must confess that
I should expect no bad consequences from such a small quantity of lime
as would be necessary for that purpose. It will produce a salt which
will have the same effects as that tartareous crust called wine-stone,
and will act as a laxative, like the salts which our apothecaries
prepare from that calcareous stone crab’s-eyes, by means of vinegar or
lemon-juice. The lime, which the acid of the wine cannot dissolve,
will fall to the bottom as a sediment, and assist to clarify the wine.
Used however in too great quantity, it may hasten the destruction
of the still remaining spirituous part, and render the wine weak; a
caution which has been given to wine-merchants by Neumann.
Gypsum is a compound of sulphuric acid with lime, and were it always
pure, its effects upon wine would be imperceptible; but as the most
kinds of common gypsum contain abundance of carbonate of lime, they
effervesce with acids, are dissolved in part by them, and form that
salt which I have before said I consider as harmless. By means of this
carbonate gypsum improves sour wine, as well as common wine. I took
half an ounce of that gypsum which at Osterode is pounded and used as
mortar, and which is hard, white, and shining, and almost of the nature
of alabaster. When I had pounded it, I put it into strong vinegar in
a glass vessel, and suffered it to boil for a few minutes. I then
strained it through filtering-paper; and what remained, after it was
washed and dried, weighed 215 grains; so that the vinegar had dissolved
25 grains, which were precipitated afterwards by carbonated alkali. I
pursued the like process with half an ounce of burnt gypsum, such as is
used here for floors; and I found that two ounces of the same vinegar
dissolved half a drachm of it, which was somewhat more in proportion
than of the former. Every one whom I caused to taste of this vinegar
remarked that both had lost a considerable share of their acidity; but
that the vinegar which had been boiled with burnt gypsum had lost the
most. Few kinds of native gypsum are perfectly pure; and at any rate
we have no reason to suppose that the ancients sought pure gypsum for
their wines. This method is not yet disused. We are told by Arvieux,
that it is still employed in the island of Milo; and I shall here take
occasion to observe that salt water also is added to wine there, even
at present. Christopher Vega, whom I have before quoted, reproaches
the Spaniards with the use of gypsum; and it has been condemned by
the modern as well as the ancient physicians. An Englishman of the
name of Hardy seems to suspect that gypsum contains lead and arsenical
earth[730]; but it appears that this writer doubted whether our gypsum
be the same as that of the ancients; and indeed it is necessary,
before we use their information respecting natural objects, to examine
carefully whether they understood by any name what we understand by it;
and what they meant by gypsum has been determined neither by Stephanus,
Ferber, nor Gesner. We however know this much, that the ancients burnt
their gypsum, and that they formed and cast images of it[731]. In my
opinion wine cannot be poisoned by gypsum; and wine-merchants who
employ it and lime deserve no severer punishment than brewers, who, in
the like manner, render sour beer fitter to be drunk and more saleable.
That the ancients were accustomed to clarify their wine with gypsum, is
proved by different passages of the Greek writers on husbandry. They
threw gypsum into their new wine; stirred it often round, then let it
stand for some time, and, when it had settled, poured off the clear
liquor[732]. It would, however, appear that they had remarked that
gypsum caused the spirituous part to disappear; for we read that the
wine acquired by it a certain sharpness which it afterwards lost, but
that the good effects of the gypsum were lasting[733]. This process in
modern times has been publicly forbidden, in many countries, as it was
in Spain in the year 1348.
Calcined shells were in ancient times used instead of lime[734].
Potters-earth was also thrown into wine, in order to clarify it by
carrying the muddy particles with it to the bottom. This method I have
seen employed in the breweries at Amsterdam, to purify the water. In
the south of France it is used for clarifying wine-stone ley; and in my
opinion it might be useful on many other occasions[735].
The ancients poisoned their wine with lead without knowing it; but at
what period did that pernicious practice begin of employing sugar of
lead and litharge? Litharge was not unknown to the ancients; for it is
mentioned by Dioscorides, Aëtius, and others. Sugar of lead is, indeed,
more modern; but I have found no information respecting the invention
of it, except that it was known to Paracelsus, who died in 1541, and
who ventured to prescribe it for some disorders. It was known also
to Angelus Sala, one of the most ingenious of the early chemists. In
the Roman laws no particular orders occur against the adulteration
or poisoning of wine; for what we read in the Institutiones[736] is
applicable only to the spoiling of another person’s wine, and thereby
occasioning a loss to him; and this explanation is confirmed by the
Digesta[737]. The German prohibitions against the adulteration of wine
began in the fifteenth century, and were from time to time renewed with
additional severity. In that century, we find complaints against this
practice with lime, sulphur, and milk; but no instance occurs of the
poisoning with lead. I however conjecture that the use of litharge was
introduced in the twelfth or thirteenth century; but the framers of the
laws were not acquainted with the real poison; and instead of causing
it to be examined by the chemists, who it must be confessed had not
advanced far in their art, they contented themselves with prohibiting
the use of those things which they found considered by the ancients as
dangerous.
Among the oldest German prohibitions against the adulteration of wine
is that of Nuremberg in the year 1409; in which however there is no
notice taken of litharge. Another of the year 1475 is mentioned by
Datt[738]; but some Imperial ones of an earlier period may have been
lost[739]. In the year 1487 the emperor caused an order against the
adulteration of wine to be published by the governments in Swabia,
Franconia and Alsace; and this practice was a subject of deliberation
at the diet of Rothenburg the same year, and also at the diet of Worms,
under Maximilian I., in 1495. At the diet of Lindau the use of sulphur
was in particular prohibited, and also at Freyburg in Brisgau in 1498.
In the year 1500 the same affair was discussed at Augsburg, and again
at that city in 1548, under Charles V. It appears that this business
was left afterwards to the care of the different princes, who from time
to time issued prohibitions against so destructive a fraud.
Older and severer prohibitions are however to be found in other
countries. By an order of William count of Hennegau, Holland and
Zeeland, of the year 1327, we find that long before that period it was
customary to adulterate wine with noxious and dangerous substances.
In the year 1384 the government at Brussels issued a severer order of
the like kind, in which vitriol, quicksilver and lapis calaminaris
are mentioned[740]. In France we find an old _ordonnance du prevôt de
Paris_, for the same purpose, dated September the 20th and December
the 2nd, 1371, in which no minerals are mentioned; but in that of 1696
litharge is particularly noticed[741].
Conrade Celtes, who in the year 1491 was first crowned in Germany as a
poet, gives in his panegyric on Nuremberg some information respecting
the adulteration of wine, from which we learn that he considered it
as a new invention, and ascribed it to a monk called Martin Bayr; but
his expressions are so figurative, that little can be gathered from
them[742]. We are however told by Zeller, that it was believed that
this dangerous fraud was invented in France[743]. Martin Zeiler, in
his Chronicle of Swabia (p. 65), says, “In the year 1453, the citizens
of Augsburg began to observe this fraud in the wine-market; for during
four years before, Martin Bayr, at Schwarzen-Eychen in Franconia, first
taught the German tavern-keepers and the waggoners to preserve new
wine from becoming sour; to clarify wine by sulphur; and likewise to
counterfeit it by spices, to the great prejudice of people’s health.”
In this passage there is no mention of litharge, but of other mixtures.
The oldest account of the poisonous sweetening of wine is that which
occurs in the French ordinance of 1696[744]; and Zeller’s conjecture
that it was invented or first remarked in France, seems to me the
more probable, as it appears that it was practised at Wurtemberg
about the same period. In the year 1697 it was known there that some
wine-merchants, particularly Hans George Staltser at Goppingen, used
litharge for refining wine, and by these means deprived many persons of
life, and occasioned the loss of health to others. Staltser pleaded in
excuse, that he considered the process he had employed as harmless, and
that Masskosky, physician to the town of Goppingen, who was accounted
a man of knowledge, had employed the same for his wine. Brugel also,
physician to the town of Heidenheim, had declared that litharge was
not prejudicial; and as he was a person of reputation, his opinion had
tended not a little to establish the use of that practice. This report
was so hurtful to the wine-trade of Wurtemberg, which at that time
brought a great deal of money into the duchy from other countries,
that the wine at Ulm remained unsold; and duke Everhard Louis was
obliged to cause experiments to be made to ascertain the nature of the
substances mixed with it. Solomon Keysel, the duke’s physician, and
J. Gaspar Harlin, physician to the court, both declared that litharge
was noxious, but that sulphur besprinkled with bismuth was still more
so. They strongly advised, therefore, that both these substances
should be forbidden to be used, under the heaviest penalties; and this
prohibition was put in force with the greater severity as some persons
of the first rank had for several years before caused their spoiled
and sour wine to be made sweet and clear in this manner by a weaver of
Pforzheim, who resided at Stutgart. An order was issued on the 10th
of May 1697, forbidding this adulteration under pain of death and
confiscation of property, as well as of being declared infamous; and
the duke requested the neighbouring states, particularly Bavaria and
Eychstat, to keep a more watchful eye over their wine-merchants and
waggoners, by which means it was supposed all danger would be avoided.
In the following year, the city of Ulm discovered a poor man at
Giengen, within its own jurisdiction, who had sweetened with litharge
some sour wine purchased at Wurtemberg. He was accordingly banished
from the country; and several other persons in the duchy were condemned
to labour at the fortifications. This example was attended with so
good an effect, that for some time adulteration was not heard of;
but eight years after, John Jacob Ehrni of Eslingen introduced that
practice again with some variation, and not only employed it himself,
but induced others to follow it in several other places. Greater
severity was at length exercised. Ehrni was beheaded; the possessors of
adulterated wine were fined, and the wine was thrown away. After this
second example, which was followed in other parts of the country, the
art of adulterating wine seems to have been more carefully concealed,
or to have been entirely abandoned. But in the present century
treatises have been published on the management of wine, in which the
art of improving it by litharge has been taught, as a method perfectly
free from danger[745].
For detecting metal in wine, the arsenical liver of sulphur is
commonly employed; a solution of which is called _liquor probatorius
Wurtembergicus_[746]. This appellation, in my opinion, has been given
to it because it was first applied for that purpose by a public order
in the duchy of Wurtemberg; though the invention is ascribed to one
of the duke’s physicians[747]. The use of it however is not attended
with certainty, because it precipitates several metals black without
distinction, and lead is not the only one that we have reason to
suspect in wine.
The operation of fumigating wine with sulphur is performed by kindling
rags of linen dipped in melted brimstone, and suffering the vapour to
enter a cask filled, or partly filled, with that liquor. I do not know
at what period this process was invented; but it is worthy of remark,
that we are told by Pliny[748], that in his time some employed sulphur
in the preparation of wine. On this subject he quotes Cato; but the
passage to which he alludes is not to be found in the works of that
author handed down to us; and the method in which it was really used
is consequently unknown. Reason and experience show that the vapour of
sulphur stops the fermentation so hurtful to wine, and prevents it from
spoiling; and many writers on the management of wine allow the free
use of it for that purpose[749]. It can certainly do no injury to the
health; and it was not necessary for the police in different countries
to distribute prescriptions for employing it, to forbid it, or to limit
the quantity[750].
Some wine-dealers are accustomed to sprinkle over with bismuth the rags
dipped in sulphur used for fumigating wine, and this addition is a
German invention[751]. It has been severely forbidden by express laws;
and there are undoubtedly sufficient grounds for its being reprobated.
At any rate this metallic addition is of no use in any point of view,
as the most experienced dealers in wine have long since acknowledged.
In an old Imperial ordinance, milk also is mentioned as an article used
in the adulterating of wine. This method was known to and practised by
the ancient Grecians[752]. But in the opinion of Von Rohr milk cannot
be employed for that purpose[753]. “One can scarcely comprehend,” says
he, “how the framers of laws should ever imagine that a wine-dealer
would be so simple as to adulterate wine with milk; and those who do
so, deserve not to be punished for their folly. As they will find no
purchasers to wine adulterated by so strange a mixture, that punishment
will be sufficient.” The effects of milk however may be easily
comprehended. It causes the wine to throw up a scum, which carries
with it every impurity; and this being taken off along with it, the
wine must of course be rendered much clearer. However, though this
mixture cannot be called an adulteration, it is certain that wine may
be refined much better by isinglass, and that method is followed at
present.
I shall observe in the last place, that in the year 1472, Stum-wine,
as it is called, was prohibited as a bad liquor prejudicial to the
health[754]. By this term is understood wine, the fermentation of which
has been checked, and which on that account continues sweet; seldom
becomes clear; and, even when it clarifies, turns muddy when exposed
to the air, because the fermentation, which has been stopped, again
commences[755]. Wines of this kind are allowed at present. They are
called _vina muta_ or _suffocata_, and have a great resemblance to a
sort of wine made principally at Bordeaux, to which the French give the
name of _vin en rage_.
[In no country of the world has the adulteration and brewing of wines
attained to such a pitch of perfection as in this “tight little
island.” So impudently and notoriously are these frauds practised,
and so boldly are they avowed, that there are books published called
‘Publican’s Guides’ and ‘Licensed Victuallers’ Directors,’ in which
the most infamous receipts imaginable are laid down to swindle their
customers[756]. One of these recommends port wine to be manufactured,
after sulphuring a cask, with twelve gallons of strong port; six of
rectified spirit; three of cognac brandy; forty-two of fine rough
cider; making sixty-three gallons, which cost about eighteen shillings
a dozen. Another receipt is forty-five gallons of cider; six of brandy;
eight of port wine; two gallons of sloes stewed in two gallons of
water, and the liquor pressed off. If the colour is not good, tincture
of red sanders or cudbear is directed to be added. This may be bottled
in a few days, and a tea-spoonful of powder of catechu being added to
each, a fine crusted appearance on the bottles will quickly follow. The
ends of the corks being soaked in a strong decoction of brazil-wood
and a little alum, will complete this interesting process, and give
them the appearance of age. Oak-bark, elder, brazil-wood, privet, beet,
turnsole, are all used in making fictitious port wine.
The wines of Madeira are in like manner adulterated or wholly
manufactured in England, which from these devices may justly claim
the title of a universal wine country, where every species is made if
it be not grown. The basis of the adulteration of madeira is vidonia,
mingled with a little port, mountain, and cape, sugar-candy and
bitter-almonds, and the colour made lighter or deepened to the proper
shade, as the case may require. Even vidonia itself is adulterated with
cider, rum, and carbonate of soda to correct acidity. Bucellas, cape,
in short every species of wine that it is worth while to imitate, is
adulterated or manufactured in this country with cheaper substances.
Common Sicilian wine has been metamorphosed so as to pass for tokay and
lachryma christi; even cape wine itself has been imitated by liquids,
if possible inferior to the genuine article.
Gooseberry wine is often passed off for champagne; the very bottles are
bought up for the purpose of filling with gooseberry wine, and are then
corked to resemble champagne. It has also been made from white and raw
sugar, citric or tartaric acid, water, home-made grape wine or perry
and French brandy--cochineal or strawberries have been added to imitate
the pink. In fact vegetation has been exhausted, and the bowels of the
earth ransacked to supply trash for this most vicious practice.
Redding observes, in his valuable and most interesting work on the
History and Description of Modern Wines, that the clumsy attempts at
wine-brewing made a century ago would be scorned by a modern adept. It
is said that when George the Fourth was in the “high and palmy” days
of early dissipation, he possessed a very small quantity of remarkably
choice and scarce wine. The gentlemen of his suite, whose taste was
hardly second to their master’s, finding it had not been demanded,
thought it was forgotten, and, relishing its virtues, exhausted it
almost to the last bottle, when they were surprised by the unexpected
command that the wine should be forthcoming at an entertainment on
the following day. Consternation was visible on their faces; a hope
of escaping discovery hardly existed, when one of them, as a last
resource, went off in haste to a noted wine-brewer in the city,
numbered among his acquaintance, and related his dilemma. “Have you
any of the wine left for a specimen?” said the adept; “O yes, there
are a couple of bottles.” “Well then, send me one, and I will forward
the necessary quantity in time; only tell me the latest moment it can
be received, for it must be drunk immediately.” The wine was sent, the
deception answered; the princely hilarity was disturbed by no discovery
of the fictitious potation, and the manufacturer was thought a very
clever fellow by his friends. What would Sir Richard Steele have said
to so neat an imitation, when in his day he complains that sinister
fabrications were coarsely managed with sloe-juice? the science of
adulteration must then have been in its infancy.]