its cost, which depends largely on its size and the fancy of the buyer.
For instance, a 50-cent cigar will burn no better nor be much, if any
more fragrant than a 25-cent cigar. It may be larger, and the large
Havana leaves, free from veins and suitable for use as wrappers for
fine, large cigars are so scarce and high, as to enhance their cost out
of all proportion to that of an equally well flavored, though smaller
cigar. In fact, 10 or 15 cents should procure as good a medium sized
cigar as average people care to smoke. The dude’s dollar cigar is not
much, if any better, except as fancy makes it so.
Many of the 5-cent cigars sold so extensively, contain a large
proportion of Havana tobacco, and make a fairly fragrant and pleasant
smoke. It is said that there are upwards of 100,000 open and proprietary
brands of cigars on the market.
CIGARETTES.—The sale of these little paper tubes filled with tobacco,
has grown enormously within a few years and is still increasing. It is
whispered that the ladies even, sometimes seek to find in them a whiff
of the solace and comfort their brothers and husbands find in the pipe
or cigar. There are many favorite brands on the market.
SNUFF.—This article which is made from the stems and refuse of the
tobacco, or largely so, is comparatively little used in this country;
but in some sections, and especially in the South it is sold to a
considerable extent. It comes in bulk and in jars, bottles, bladders,
and packets. Among the varieties are “Carolina Sweet” and plain Scotch
Snuff, Maccaboy and coarse French Rappee, scented or plain.
SOAP.
Soap is made by boiling down oils or fats in a water solution of caustic
soda or potash. Through the acid properties of the fats, the oleine,
stearine, margarine, etc., which they contain, combine with the alkali
to produce the saponified compound.
Hard soap is made with soda; soft soap with potash. The more oleine in
the fat, the softer the soap; the more stearine the harder. Rosin is
also largely used, sometimes to the extent of one-third the weight of
the soap. It increases its hardness, makes it dissolve easier in water
and forms a more copious lather.
The Most Economical Soap.
Soap may be two-thirds water and still remain solid. Even dry, hard soap
contains 20 or 25 per cent. of moisture. An excess of water causes soap
to waste or dissolve too freely in use; hence, as soap is perpetually
losing water by evaporation, the most economical to buy is that with
some age and moderately dry, yet not so much dried that it will not
dissolve readily and make a good lather or suds.
Effects of Strong Soap on Fabrics.
Soap must not be strong enough to injure fabrics or discharge colors,
yet sufficiently powerful to render grease and dirt soluble, so that it
may be washed away in water. Rosin soap hardens the fibers of wool, and
alkalies, if used to excess, shrink woolen fabrics. Hard water, or that
containing lime or magnesia, more or less decomposes soap, and it floats
on the surface as a greasy scum. But if an oily film rises to the top of
soft water, it shows that the fat in the soap is not all saponified.
Soft water is better than hard for fabrics.
What Soaps Are Made Of.
COMMON YELLOW BAR SOAP contains soda with fat and rosin. WHITE SOAP
consists of tallow and soda. CASTILE SOAP is made of olive oil and soda.
COMMON FANCY SOAPS are mainly ordinary soap colored and scented. Real
BROWN WINDSOR SOAP is made of goat tallow, olive oil and soda.
TRANSPARENT SOAPS are those which have been dissolved in alcohol. FINE
TOILET SOAPS are made with as little alkali as possible, of almond, palm
or olive oil, suet, lard, etc., colored and perfumed.
SHAVING SOAPS and CREAMS are made either with soda or potash, of fine
tallow or cocoanut oil, which has the property of making a strong
lather. MOTTLED SOAPS owe their variegations of color to the use of iron
oxides. It is said that these cannot be effectively applied if the soap
contains an excess of water, and that more skill is required to make
good blue mottled soap than any other. The more any soap is worked over,
or remelted, cooled, etc., the better it becomes.
A Wide Range of Choice.
There is a great variety of soaps upon the market, and language has been
ransacked to find appropriate names for them. Among them are “FAMILY,”
“LAUNDRY,” “IVORY,” “BEST SOAP,” “ELECTRIC,” “OZONE,” “BORAX,” “SAND
SOAP,” “SILVER SOAP,” “SAPOLIO,” etc., and many scouring and detergent
articles, as “PEARLINE,” “SOAPINE,” “SCOURENE,” “WASHING COMPOUND,”
“WASHING CRYSTAL,” etc.
In Toilet Soaps there is an equally wide range of choice, embracing
every color and variegation of color, and every perfume that is
agreeable to the smell. Soaps are also charged with disinfecting
substances, as carbolic acid, etc., and variously medicated with
sulphur, camphor, glycerine, and other materials for softening and
healing the skin.
STARCH.
Laundry starch is mostly made from corn. The grain is crushed and
fermented to a degree, when the starch is washed out and allowed to
settle in large vats. The best qualities are washed and settled again
and again; the number of washings grading the strength, purity and cost.
Potato starch is more costly than corn starch, and, as it gives a softer
finish to fabrics, is chiefly used by manufacturers. Corn starch for
culinary purposes is thoroughly washed, purified and deodorized. Laundry
starch should never be eaten.
The best laundry starch is in large, hard, flinty crystals; such
indicate a stronger starch, containing less moisture than that with
small or soft crystals. Laundry starch comes in bulk or boxes, and in
paper packages. There are many fancy proprietary brands of starch, as
“IVORY,” “IVORINE,” “GLOSS,” “SATIN GLOSS,” “SILVER GLOSS,” “GLOSS
POLISH,” “ELASTIC,” etc. Some of them are powdered, and contain borax,
wax, or gum, etc., and are scented with winter-green, etc. Such come
higher than the better grades of laundry starch in crystals, but it is a
question if they are proportionately superior for family use. STARCH
POLISHES are preparations of spermaceti, wax, or paraffine.
Blueing (Laundry).
This article may be had in balls, powders, or in a liquid form. There
are a goodly number of proprietary brands, some of which give a tint
which appears somewhat greenish when placed by the side of a pure and
delicate blue. The coloring principle is usually indigo, Prussian blue,
or the favorite ultramarine. The most satisfactory laundry blueing is
that which is really and intensely blue in tint, and which is most
completely soluble in water, so that it will be well distributed and not
make the clothes look streaked.
Candles.
In some sections, candles form an important article of trade. They are
now made in a great variety of exquisite tints by the use of analine
colors of various sizes and weights, and with patent self-fitting ends.
The more costly kinds are made of spermaceti, wax, stearine, paraffine,
etc., down to the pressed, adamantine, and common tallow candles. Some
carry embossed and handsome decalcomania decorations and are either
white, blue, green, pink, yellow, red, etc., or assorted. There are
“BOUDOIR,” “PIANO,” “CLEOPATRA,” “CABLE,” and “FLAG” candles, wax “NIGHT
LIGHTS,” “CHRISTMAS TREE CANDLES,” and wax “GAS LIGHTERS,” warranted not
to drip.
BRUSHES.—No domestic article is in more common use than the brush in its
various forms. The best bristles come from the wild hog of Russia and
Poland. The whitest and finest are used for paint, tooth, hat, hair, and
clothes brushes. Some brushes are made with one tuft only, like the
paint brush, others with many. The best are “Wire drawn;” that is, the
tufts are bent double to form loops through which wires are passed, to
draw and hold them firmly into the holes of the base. Others have the
tufts wedged or glued in. Brushes are made with long and short handles,
and of every conceivable form and quality, from “Sink scrubs” upward.
BROOMS.—The finer the corn the better the broom. A natural green color
indicates toughness and flexibility, and such corn is better than that
which is of a sickly yellow or lemon color. But the latter is often
given the desired green tint by artificial colorings. Plain or unpainted
handles are best, good brooms weigh 25 to 30 pounds to the dozen, but
extra large and heavy ones are made weighing 40 to 50 pounds.
WASHBOARDS.—There are fifty or more varieties of these “Monday Morning
Pianos.” Metal scrubbers are preferred to wood, which is liable to
splinter, wound the fingers, and tear the clothes. And a plain crimp is
better for fabrics than a rougher crimp, although the latter may extract
the dirt quicker. A favorite variety have adjustable chest protectors.
CLOTHES PINS are of two kinds, the old fashioned and the spring clasp.
The latter are little used.
MOPS.—There are two kinds in the stores; one of twisted twine, which is
generally thought to be most durable, the other of cotton and less
expensive.
STOVE POLISH.—This is chiefly plumbago or black lead. Among the favorite
brands are “DIXON,” “RISING SUN,” “A. B. C.,” etc. There is also a
liquid preparation or “Enamel,” said to give a good polish without dust
or smell, and with little labor.
BLACKING.—The best is that which will, without injury to the leather,
most easily and quickly give a handsome and durable polish. Besides the
excellent domestic varieties, there are the French Marcerou, and
Jacquot’s, in tin boxes, which are reliable and but little more
expensive, and the old time Day & Martin’s blacking in stone jugs. For
ladies’ use there are many domestic and imported SHOE DRESSINGS in
liquid form, which require no rubbing.
MATCHES.—Common sulphur matches are made both square and round, and come
packed in various kinds of boxes and papers. PARLOR MATCHES, of
American, Swedish, and other foreign manufacture, are made without
sulphur; and chloride of potash, antimony, etc., are often used instead
of phosphorus. The splints are sometimes soaked in oil or paraffine to
make them burn freely. SAFETY MATCHES have the phosphorus on sand paper
and the other materials on the ends of the splints, and neither can be
ignited except by friction with the other. There are many kinds of WAX
TAPERS, “FLAMING LIGHTS,” etc.
SEEDS.—The raising of seeds has become a large industry. Leading
producers make careful tests of all their seeds, and even offer valuable
prizes for the best vegetables and flowers grown from them. Some grocers
lay in every season a fresh and full supply of all the seeds used in the
garden or field, and they are almost always reliable.
BIRDSEED, FOOD, ETC.—Canary seed comes both in bulk and pound packages,
either alone or mixed with millet, German rape seed, etc.; many packages
contain a piece of cuttle fish bone. There are BIRD GRAVEL, BIRD PEPPER,
MOCKING BIRD FOOD in bottles, etc.
INSECT POWDER.—There are a number of these vegetable preparations which
are effective, if genuine and unadulterated, as the PERSIAN, BUHACH (or
Californian), DALMATIAN, etc.
DISINFECTANTS.—Chloride of Lime in various sized packages of tin and
paper, and various liquid preparations in bottles and kegs, are put up
for domestic use.
PAILS.—Ordinary water pails have either 2 or 3 hoops. Those not painted
on the inside are preferred. Wood pulp pails give good satisfaction, and
a new pail with sunken hoops is just coming into market.
Grocers’ Sundries.
Among other articles sometimes kept by the grocer, may be mentioned:
Irish Moss, Anatto and other butter colorings, Licorice, Chewing Gum,
Fruit Juices, Hops, Rennet, Ink, Paper and Pens, Pencils, Slates,
Mucilage, Playing Cards, Beeswax, Cement, Concentrated Potash, Lye,
Lime, Chalk, Oils, Kerosene, Dyes, Paints dry and mixed; Rosin, Tar,
Turpentine, White Lead, Varnishes, Indigo, Glue, Putty, Powder, Shot,
Caps, Wads, Axle Grease, Curry Combs, Condition Powders, Can Openers,
Cordage, Coffee Mills, Bath Brick, Polishing Powder, Wick, Baskets,
Boxes in Nests, Tubs, Dippers, Measures, Lemon Squeezers, Mouse Traps,
Sieves, Feather Dusters, Rolling Pins, Ax Handles, Tacks, Crockery,
Glass and Stone Ware, Borax, Bay Rum, Ammonia, Sponges, Camphor, Sal
Soda, Perfumes, Plasters, Fly Killer Paper, Witch Hazel, and a great
variety of standard drugs and proprietary medicines.
WINES AND LIQUORS.
While there are some grocers who, for various reasons do not handle
these products, there are also many who keep for the family use of their
customers a full line of choice wines, malt beverages, and distilled
liquors. This work would therefore be incomplete without reference to
these articles, and it is believed that the few facts given below
concerning them will be found interesting and instructive.
WINES.
Pure wine is merely grape juice fermented. When the sugar of the grape
is wholly or nearly converted by fermentation into natural vinous
spirits or alcohol, the result is a STILL or DRY WINE. If the sugar is
very abundant, as in overripe grapes, and a considerable portion of it
remains unfermented, a SWEET WINE like Tokay or Malmsey is produced.
When fermentation has proceeded to a certain stage and the liquid is
bottled, so that it continues to ferment and produce carbonic acid gas,
the result is an effervescent wine, as SPARKLING CHAMPAGNE. If, during
fermentation, the process be arrested by the addition of alcohol,
certain vegetable substances are retained in the liquid, and such wines
as PORT and SHERRY are the product.
Composition of Wines.
Wines, as well as all varieties of malt and spirituous liquors, owe
their intoxicating qualities to alcohol. But the medical and dietetic
qualities of wine are not solely due to it; a mixture of water and
alcohol, or whiskey of equal strength, has a very different effect on
the animal economy. Pure wines contain also natural acids, sugar,
ethers, albumen, phosphates, etc. Their value is, however, mainly
determined by their “Bouquet” or flavor, produced by substances natural
to the grapes, heightened and rendered more delicate by fermentation.
Alcohol and Acids in Wine.
The quantity of alcohol in natural wine from grapes, varies between 5
and 12 per cent.; the quantity of free acid from 3 to 7 per cent. If
more of the latter be present, the wine tastes excessively sour, and is
less easily digested; but some acid in wine is essential, and
contributes much to its flavor and virtues. Besides the natural acids
which exist in the juice of the grape, cheap and inferior wines often
contain, also, the hurtful acids of spoiling, showing the approach to
vinegar.
WINES OF THE WORLD.
France.
Even a bird’s-eye glance at the wines of the world, might easily fill a
volume. There are the superb French wines of Burgundy and Champagne,
which ancient Provinces are now almost one splendid, continuous
vineyard; and the Clarets, Sauternes, etc. of Bordeaux and Languedoc.
Medoc and Haut Medoc are known to wine lovers everywhere, for here are
the famous vineyards of the Chateau Lafitte, owned by Baron Rothschild;
the Chateaux Margaux, Latour, and many others.
The Wines of Germany.
The principal wine districts of Germany are the valleys of the Rhine and
Moselle and their tributaries, whence come the well known Hock and the
red and white wines, which, though sometimes rather thin and deficient
in flavor, are never colored, plastered, boiled, or have spirits added
to them, and are therefore natural and wholesome. Here also is the
renowned Johannisberg Castle vineyard, owned by the family of Prince
Meternich. Every bottle of this wine bears his family arms, and it is
the beverage of Emperors and Kings. By reason of its exquisite “Bouquet”
it is pronounced “The finest and costliest drink on earth.”
Wines of Hungary, Italy, Spain, etc.
Hungary sends forth her “Imperial” opal-tinted Tokay wines, made of
overripe grapes, from which the juices are never squeezed but allowed to
drop; other Hungarian wines are as dry as those of France, as mellow as
those of Germany, and more fragrant than the choicest of Spain. Italy,
Spain and Portugal produce wines of much repute, but neither of the
latter two countries make sparkling wines; they supply Sherry and Port
which generally have spirits added to them.
American Wines.
The wines of California and other sections of the United States are
rapidly rising in popular estimation, and the time is probably not far
distant when they will rival those of any part of the world. The
consumption of domestic vintages increases with the constant improvement
in their quality, which follows the slowly acquired knowledge, as to the
best methods of turning the luscious juices of our own abundant grapes
into wine.
Champagne.
The French make four varieties of champagne, viz.: NON-MOUSSEUX,
CREMANT, MOUSSEUX, and GRAND-MOUSSEUX. The first is fully fermented
wine, fined, drawn into bottles, and allowed to rest a long time.
CREMANT is moderately sparkling. MOUSSEUX throws out its cork with an
audible report and begins gently to overflow. GRAND-MOUSSEUX pops out
the cork with a loud noise and overflows with much foam, as it has the
pressure of five atmospheres. A sound, rather dry champagne is said to
be one of the best of remedies for impaired digestion.
Good and Poor Champagne.
Good champagne throws up for a long time after being opened a continuous
stream of small, sparkling bubbles of gas:
“Each sunset ray, that mixed by chance
With the wine’s diamond, showed
How sunbeams may be taught to dance.”
Even after hours of exposure, when it has lost all its excess of
carbonic acid, good champagne still retains the characteristic flavor of
true wine, while an inferior sparkling wine becomes, after exposure,
almost as insipid as a mixture of sugar and water. The best are made
from the first pressings of the grape. Those made from a third, fourth
or fifth pressing require the addition of sugar and are cloying and far
inferior in flavor. Imitation champagnes are made by sweetening any
ordinary still wines or cider and charging them with carbonic acid gas.
MALT LIQUORS.
Malt liquors, properly so called, should be made only of malted barley,
hops, yeast and water, but other materials are also used. PORTER is a
beer of a high percentage of alcohol and made from malt dried at a high
temperature, which gives it its dark color. ALE is pale beer with
considerable alcohol and made of pale malt, with more hop extract than
porter.
As every per cent. of sugar in the malt yields by fermentation about
half a per cent. of alcohol, it is evident that ale, porter, and lager
beer are stronger or weaker, as more or less malt is used in making
them.
ALCOHOL IN BEERS.
BEERS are stimulating from their alcohol and refreshing from their
carbonic acid, besides being tonic and somewhat nutritive. The oil of
the hops gives them aroma and the lupulin they contain soothes the
nerves. Their taste is vinous, sweetish, and bitter at the same time.
The quantity of alcohol in malt liquors was given by Prof. Englehardt,
as the result of analyses made for the N. Y. State Board of Health, in
1885, as follows.
Per cent
of
alcohol
by
weight.
Lager, average 192 samples 3.754
Ale “ 199 samples 4.622
Porter ” 70 samples 4.462
Weiss Beer “ 28 samples 2.356
Beer Adulterations.
It has been popularly supposed that beer is much adulterated. But the
result of many analyses made by Mr. C. A. Crampton, for the Department
of Agriculture at Washington, last year, show him “That beer is as free
from adulteration as most other articles of consumption, and more so
than some.” The analyst found that, practically, no foreign bitters
other than hops were used; but he also found that nearly one quarter of
the samples analyzed contained, as a preservative, the unwholesome
salicylic acid. This powerful drug is also largely used in the
manufacture of cheap wines, etc., and the practice should be rigidly
prohibited.
GINGER ALE is made by fermenting sweetened water, to which extract of
ginger has been added, to such a degree as to generate carbonic acid gas
and become effervescent. It is a healthful and agreeable beverage,
containing some alcohol and being slightly stimulant.
GOOD CIDER contains 3 to 5 per cent. of alcohol. It is made from the
fermented juice of apples. Many grown people acquired their fondness for
cider on the “Old Farm” in childhood. It is sold by grocers in bulk, and
is also bottled extensively and sold as “Champagne cider,” and quite
often as champagne.
DISTILLED LIQUORS.
The disagreeable taste of freshly distilled ardent spirits is due to the
presence of fusil oil and other empyreumatic substances, which time
alone can transform into harmless ethers which smell and taste
agreeably, and produce an exhilaration over and above that of the
alcohol which holds them in solution. Spirits can be distilled from any
vegetable matter which will yield alcohol, yet many substances yield
only a rasping, nauseous or flavorless liquor, which age does not
improve. To some of these products, artificial flavors and color are
given and the imitation articles are thus placed on the market. But true
whiskey, brandy, etc., have a specific and original flavor of their own,
and contain vegetable oils and acids.
Alcohol in Liquors.
The following table shows the proportion of alcohol (by volume) in the
various liquors.
Volume of
Alcohol,
per
cent.
Cognac Brandy 55 to 70
Arrack, made from 60 to 61
Rice
Whiskey, American 60
“ Scotch 50 to 51
” Irish 50
Rum 49-7
Gin 47-8
BRANDY.—This is made from wine; that from white grapes is preferred and
it requires about seven bottles of wine to make one of brandy. Even the
best Cognac is burning and rough until kept for two or three years, and
it improves with increased age, until, when thirty or forty years old,
it develops a flavor somewhat similar to that of vanilla.
WHISKEY is a spirit distilled either from fermented malt, rye, barley,
oats, wheat or corn. The very best and sweetest grain is only used for
making good whiskey. American whiskey is more easily obtained pure than
perhaps any spirituous liquor and is therefore more reliable in this
country. The name whiskey is a corruption of the Erse and Irish word
_Usquebaugh_, “Water of Life,” the French _Eau de Vie_.
RUM is made from distilled molasses and skimmings from the boiling
sugar.
GIN is distilled from unmalted grain, the product being rectified and
flavored with juniper berries.
Favorite Brands.
CHAMPAGNES come in quarts and pints, _Sec_ or “Dry,” “Extra Dry,” etc.
Among favorite Brands are those of Heidsieck, Mumm, Roederer, Cliquot,
Bouché, Morizet, Pommery, Delbeck, etc.; the AMERICAN Champagnes of
California, Urbanna, Pleasant Valley, etc., besides various imitation
sparkling wines. Among favorite CLARETS are St. Julien, Medoc, St.
Emillion, St. Estephe, Floirac, Pontet Canet, Chateaux Margaux, Lafitte,
La Rose, etc.; also the SAUTERNES and WHITE WINES of Graves; Barsac,
Chateaux, Yquem, Latour, etc. There are the Johannisberger, Hockheimer,
Rüdesheimer, Marcobrunner of the RHINE; the ITALIEN Capri, Falerno and
Chianti; Port, Sherry and Madeira of various brands; and Claret, Port,
Sherry, Muscatel, Angelica, Tokay, and other vintages of AMERICAN MAKE.
CORDIALS include Anisette, Benedictine, Curaçao, Chartreuse, Maraschino,
Kirschwasser, Kummel, Chocolate, Ginger, Raspberry, Rock and Rye, and
Absynthe. There are Ales, Porter, Stout, Lager Beer, Peach and Apple
cider, Orgeat, Soda and Sarsaparilla. Favorite Brandies are those of
Otard, Hennessy, Martelle, Robin, Seignette, Dupin, and good California
Brandy; also Blackberry, Cherry, Ginger, Peach and Cider Brandies.
Besides scores of fine AMERICAN WHISKEYS, there are the SCOTCH Thistle
and IRISH Cruiskeen Lawn; Old Tom, London, Holland and Geneva GINS; St.
Croix, Jamaica and N. E. RUMS. Many Grocers keep also a supply of
NATURAL and ARTIFICIAL MINERAL WATERS, as the Congress, Hathorn, etc.,
of Saratoga; Carlsbad, Seltzer, Clysmic, Vichy, Apollonaris, Williams
Quelle, Lithia, Hunyadi; and a variety of Bitter Waters.
Transcriber’s Notes