would, other things being equal, have better health, better spirits, and more intelligence; that he would live a longer, more prosperous, and more useful life. But since the whole system of life is more or less artificial, and since, to some extent, the maxim, that we must take men as we find them, is, in this application, true, I must needs confess, on the other hand, that the growth of the vine seems to me one of the choicest blessings of providence to any country. In France and Italy, its chosen climates, intemperance is a vice almost unknown. The liquid which it yields is very gently exciting; and it is used with moderation, because it does not urge to excess. With ourselves, among whom the vine does not grow, I should not hesitate to say, that, as an alternative, the general substitution of the wines for ardent spirits, would be an event the most desirable. I do not speak only of their comparative expensiveness, which, however, would tend strongly to restrict their consumption within moderate bounds. Nor is the difference, strictly speaking, of the proportion of alcohol, between them and distilled spirits, so great, as is, perhaps, commonly supposed. A quart of one of the stronger wines of Spain and Portugal is found to contain about a pint of proof spirit, or a half pint of alcohol; but, whether it be, that, having only gone through the process of fermentation, the original material still retains part of its vegetable properties, so that it is disposed of by the digestive process, and enters harmlessly into the general circulation,-whether it be from this cause, or from some other not discovered, certain it is that alcohol exists in the vinous liquids in some chemical combination, which partly disarms it of its deleterious power, for it would be impossible to drink a pint of proof spirits, diluted or not, without much more serious consequences, than would attend the drinking, within the same time, of a quart of one of those wines. This, then, is one great difference. Another is, that the time it takes, and the uncomfortable bulk which must be introduced into the system, to produce the last stage of intoxication by means of the vinous liquids, are no trifling hindrance to that result;

a result, on the contrary, facilitated by that concentrated form in which alcohol exists in ardent spirits; a form, which, if I may use so plain an expression, admits of the needful quantity being so expeditiously packed. But the great and distinctive difference remains. It is, that, account for the fact as we may, as a fact it is indisputable, that, while the wines may and do intoxicate, and a man may ruin himself by their excessive use, they do not possess, like the distilled spirits, the power to create a morbid appetite for themselves, which scarcely any moral energy is equal to control; they do not, like distilled spirits, effect that change in the drunkard's constitution, which makes it all but impossible for him to refrain.

But, perhaps, we have much less to do with this question about the wines, than we imagine. Perhaps what we call by that name deserve to be suspected by us on other grounds than what are commonly alone adduced. I apprehend, my friends, that we see very little wine in this country. I suppose, that, for example, the vineyards which yield the Marsala grape, do not produce more wine in a year, than is drunk under that name, in a year, in our single State. I should not be surprised to be assured that they do not produce more than is drunk in our metropolis alone. I suppose that what can with any great propriety be called wine, is scarcely to be met with, except occasionally at the tables of the opulent; and we, whose regard for our purse, to speak of nothing better, must needs prevent us from putting ourselves to very free expense for such a luxury, I conceive need, out of regard to our health, to say no more, to refrain from meddling very freely with what goes by the name of wine. By a common wine, or a table wine, if that rather be the name by which the inferior quality is disguised, I understand to be meant nothing else than a corrupt imitation of wine. I suppose it to be undeniable that very soon after a wine becomes common among us, it becomes corrupt and unwholesome. Many of us can remember when the wine of Lisbon was in extensive use. At first it was understood to come pure, and the demand for it naturally increased.

To meet this increased demand came next an adulterated mixture, and then a most vicious counterfeit. When, at last, every one who touched it, though it were sparingly, found that he received the admonition of a head ache, or a fever, it was abandoned, and the wine of Vidonia was adopted in its place, and went through the same popularity, the same process of treatment, and the same dismission. The wines of Sicily next reached us, and for the like reason, are about to be pronounced, by an unanimous voice, intolerable. It is scarcely half a score of years since the name of the wine of Champagne was known to our dealers, and already, it is said, that a very insignificant proportion of what is sold and consumed under that name among us, ever heaved on a wave of the Atlantic. How, where, and by whom these substances are manufactured, by which trusting customers are poisoned, of course no one can tell, any more than where counterfeit money is struck, for secrecy is the life of the traffic. What are the ingredients, however, the faithful test of chemical analysis with indubitable certainty discloses. Along with some inconsiderable basis of the liquid which is to give its name to the compound whole, and a copious addition of alcohol and water, they are such, according to the particular case, as a decoction of the oak wood to give astringency; elder flowers, and log wood to heighten the color; alum, gypsum, and potash, to clarify; and sugar of lead, one of the most active poisons, to cover acidity. These particulars I do not state as being disclosed by any investigations made among ourselves. I am speaking of practices which recent developments show to exist, on a large scale, in the parent country. As long ago as Mr Addi-, son's time, there was occasion for him to speak of a certain fraternity of chemical operators, who,' said he, 'by the power of magical drugs and incantations, raise under the streets of London, the choicest products of the hills and vallies of France. They can turn a plantation of northern hedges into a vineyard. They can squeeze Bourdeaux out of the sloe, and draw Champagne from an apple.' Since that time, not

only has the trade of the wine brewers, as they are called, been largely extended in that metropolis, so as to employ a vast capital, but, in the wide division of labor which it occasions, it is affirmed that distinct branches of the English commerce relate to the supply of one or another of the materials which that business requires.

Remarks essentially similar are to be made respecting other stimulating liquids in common use. Containing the intoxicating essence in a still less concentrated form than the wines, they are so far less likely to be abused by excess. The fermented juice of the apple, being prepared under the consumer's eye, may by him be known to be free from hurtful mixture, though, to say nothing of cases of its intemperate use, by very many constitutions, at least, it is found so to conduce to a feverish habit of body, as to be quite unsuitable to be a common refreshment, or a restorative under fatigue. The same security may be felt as to other fermented liquors of domestic manufacture; that is, in the particular of their being what they profess to be; though it is said, with what truth I leave to the better informed judgement of professional men, that the imperfect fermentation, to which they are apt to be subjected, is a circumstance making it advisable that they should be cautiously resorted to, except by persons in the firmest health. The malt liquors, from the public establishments, to be pure should contain no other admixture than that of water, malt and hops. From the circumstance which has been named, that is, the diluted state in which they present the inebriating principle, it is not a compendious process to abuse them to purposes of the worst excess, though perhaps the plethoric intemperance which they may produce, is, on the whole, the most odious aspect which the habit wears. They too have been the subject of atrocious practices in the parent country, where they make, or made, the common drink of the people at large. Wormwood, quassia, and aloes, as cheaper materials, have been found to be used, instead of hops, to give the bitter taste; and, so far, apart from the pecuniary

fraud, no great harm would be done. But, in addition to such ingredients, use has been ascertained to be made of capsicum and grains of paradise, two highly acrid substances; of alum, sulphuric acid, cherry-laurel, opium, hen-bane, and copperas. From these and other drugs, beer, so called, is even made without any portion of hops or malt whatever, and the persons who supply them are known as a class under the name of brewers' chemists. In a popular English treatise on brewing, it is affirmed that malt, to produce intoxication, must be used in such large quantities as would very much diminish, if not exclude, the brewer's profit. Accordingly, the writer, who was an experienced manufacturer, allows that the intoxicating qualities of porter are to be ascribed to the various drugs intermixed with it, and declares that, without them, he could never produce the liquor, of that quality which was most in esteem. One of these pernicious substitutes is furnished by the poisonous plant denominated in botany the Cocculus Indicus, the same, I suppose, from which is prepared the maddening drug called bangue, used in the place of opium by the lower order of Turks. The growing extent of the demand for this, as a succedaneum in beer, may be estimated from the fact, that, while it is not known to be put to any other extensive use in England, its price was nearly quadrupled in that country within a few years. They who perforce must look to such sources of supply for a substance of daily consumption, may well have their serious misgivings. And developements like these may reasonably make us suspicious and sparing of the imported liquors of this kind, whose history we have not means to trace. That, to such an extent, the like substances are prepared among ourselves under the direction of persons whose character is a pledge of fair dealing, is a security which we have no small cause to value. We have only further to remember that the strongly narcotic quality of the hops, which properly belong to them, seems to dictate a forbearing use of them to be made by whoever, for God's glo