_An enquiry into what may be, at all times, a proper
stock of Beer, and the management of it in the cellars._
The business of a brewer is not confined to the mere manufacture of his
commodity; his concerns, as a trader, deserve no less regard, and, in a
treatise like this, should not be entirely omitted.
As it is a fault not to have a sufficient stock of beers it the
cellars, to serve the customers, it is one also to have more than is
needful. By the first of these errors, the beers would be generally
new and ill disposed for precipitation; by the other, quantities of
stale beer must remain, which, becoming hard, will at last turn stale,
and be unfit for use, unless blended with new brewed beers, to their
detriment. These faults, if continued, may in time affect a whole
trade, and ought therefore carefully to be avoided. For these reasons,
the whole quantity to be moved, or expected to be supplied from the
brewer’s store cellars, during the space of one twelvemonth, should be
calculated, as near as possible; half this quantity ought to be the
stock kept up from November to May inclusive, and nearly one third part
thereof be remaining in September. From hence a table may be formed, by
which it will be easy, at one view, to know the quantity that should
be maintained at every season of the year, and to avoid almost every
inconveniency, which otherwise must arise. Suppose, for example, the
number of casks expected to be moved in a year, to be 320 butts, and
248 puncheons, the store cellars ought to be supplied, as to time and
quantity, in the following proportion.
Butts. Puncheons.
January 160 124
February 160 124
March 160 124
April 160 124
May 160 124
June 146 113
July 133 103
August 120 93
September 107 82
October 133 103
November 160 124
December 160 124
After beers have been started in the cellars, the casks should be
well and carefully stopped down, as soon as the repelling force of
fermentation is so much lessened, as not to be able to oppose this
design. Otherwise the elastic air, which is the vivifying principle of
the drink, being lost, it would become vapid, and flat; and if left a
long time in this condition, perhaps grow sour.
It has already been observed, that cellars, in winter, are more hot
than the exterior air by 10 degrees, and more cold in summer by 5
degrees. But besides this general difference, repositories of beer
vary surprisingly in their temperature; from the nature of the soil in
which they are built, from their exposition to the sun, or from other
incidental causes. As heat is a very powerful agent in accelerating
fermentation, it is by no means surprising, not only that some cellars
do ripen drinks much sooner than others, but also that a difference
is often perceived in the same cellar. The persons entrusted with the
choice of beers, with which the customers are to be served, should
not be satisfied to send out their guiles in the progressive order
in which they were brewed, but ought, on every occasion, to note any
alteration that happens in the drink, as this is doing justice both to
the commodity, and to the consumer, who has a constant right to expect
his beer in due order.