The Sun.
London, England, 1829-08-20 00:00:00

STEAM DISTILLATION.

It always gives us pleasure to see the inge-
nuity and science of individuals rewarded by suc-
cess. When Sir Humphry Davy directed the
resources of his great mind to the discovery of a
means for protecting human life from the cala-
mities to which it was so frequently exposed by
the explosion of fire-damp in the coal-mines of
Newcastle, nothing could be more gratifying than
the production of the safety-lamp, under the in-
fluence of which the poor collier could follow
his avocation in perfect confidence of the protec-
tion it afforded him. In like manner, when the
inventions of Watt were applied to navigation,
and the mariner was at length conducted through
storms which no sailing craft would willingly have
faced, the triumph of science seemed to have
attained a height which its most ardent admirers
seemed scarcely ever to have anticipated. Ac-
counting ourselves among the humblest of these,
it was nevertheless our fortune to be called upon
lately to examine a new and very unexpected
application of the same principle in the manu-
facture of spirits, which is now carried on to a
considerable extent at the distillery of Mr. Stein,
in the village of Kirkliston. The machinery re-
quired, though apparently complicated, is con-
structed on a very simple principle ; by means of
which, the vapour rising from the distilled wash
is brought into immediate contact with the va-
pour of water, and is thus purified of all the
oily matter with which common whisky is in ge-
neral so loaded, and to free it of which so much
labour and expense is incurred by the distiller,
and very often incurred itt vain. The spirit pro-
duced is consequently so superior in quality that
it may be compared to the best small still whisky
produced in the Highlands. This fact we took
the first opportunity of putting to the test. Mr.
Stein had the goodness to present us with a
bottle of this spirit which had been manufactured
only ten days before, and having occasion to
dine the same day where a party of thirty gen-
tlemen were assetnbled, we gave Mr. Barry our
bottle and desired him to introduce it when
asked for, which we did by telling the preses
that we were anxious for the opinion of the
company on a bottle of whisky of an extraordi-
nary age ; and the reader may be sure that
it gratified us not a little to find, that every indi-
vidual present pronounced it excellent but some-
what strong, (it was 15° over proof) declaring
that if it were not from Glenlivet it must cer-

tainly have been brought from the West • High-
lands. A more satisfactory opinion of the merits
of steam distillation we do not think could easily
be obtained. But it is not alone in the goodness
of the spirit that we rejoice at the success of this
invention ; it is also because the very best spirit
can now be brought into the market at a price
which will completely put an end to illicit distil-
lation. If the small still whisky, which can only
be obtained by a prolonged process, ill adapted to
any thing like commercial pursuits, and which is
encouraged alone by the superiority of the article
produce and the high price it consequently
commands in the market, can be fully equalled in
quality by the production of the legal distiller,
there will be an end of its manufacture. This
newly invented process we therefore regard as an
object deeply interesting to Government, and as
the means of removing one of the principal
sources of demoralization and crimes in the North
of Scotland.—Caledonian Mercury.

In countries where camels are bred in great
numbers land carriage is almost as cheap as that by water.
The carriage, for instance, of a camel-load of goods,
weighing from 600 to 700 pounds, from Bagdad to Aleppo,
a distance of 600 miles, is 41.

BALKAN MOUNTAINS.—As we advanced
this day (Bth of April, 1827) we passed over and by se-
veral mountains, whose summits were covered with im-
mense masses of marble and granite, in such incongruous
and fantastic forms, as quite to bewilder the imagination
in trying to account fur their being so placed and thrown
together. Sometimes a huge square block, flanked by
taller and smaller pieces, resembling a feudal castle, perch-
ed upon a height, and frowning down with its battlements
upon the passes. Sometimes a large rock, curiously ba-
lanced upon another, looked as if it could be thrust down
by the efforts of a pigmy into the plains, and made to
crush every thing in its fall. Here a block placed upon a
kind of plateau, looked for all the world like some huge
tortoise upon a dish ; and there were other masses which
resembled men's heads and hands, and birds and beasts, in
all imaginable postures and situations. In abort, it was a
perfect chaos, ani looked liked the vast ruins of some an-
terior formation, or the wreck of a world destroyed by the
Titans of fable. A great deal of the marble was of the
most brilliant white.—Frankland's Travels.

THE KILL-AND-CURE DOCTOR.—A trial
came on during the last Lent Assizes, whilst the Judges
were on Circuit, in which an ignorant country surgeon
was the principal witness for the prosecution. Of course,
in his cross-examination, the Council for the defendant at-
tempted to shake his testimony; and, as the case turned on
a point of practice, for this purpose he principally relied on
the fact that he was an interloper in the medical profession,
and totally destitute of surgical skill. " Pray, Doctor,"
cried the Advocate in a voice of thunder, " did not
(naming a former patient) die under your hands?" " Why
—he did." " And —?" " Ye-yes." " And —?"
" Why—l can't deny it !" " Well, Sir, and pray what
was your occupation before you presumed to intrude into
a liberal profession ?" " I was--a—a—bacon curer, Sir."
" A bacon curer !" answered the Counsellor, his stern
features relaxing into a smile, " then that accounts for it.
You thought it was with your patients as with your hogs
—you must kill them before you could cure them.

don for Terceira, had been taken possession of
by the Portuguese blockading squadron off that
island, and sent to St. Michael's. This capture
was made on the Ist of June, and the brig was
not released till the 3d instant, being thus de-
tained upwards of two months. The outrage to
which we have alluded was committed on the
person of Mr. William Champion, the acting
master of this vessel. We give below, in an ex-
tract from a private letter, the details of the wan-
ton brutality by which he suffered. There
seems, however, to be no evidence that the out-
rage was exclusively aimed at a British subject :

" St. Michael's, Aug. 3.
" I have now to acquaint you of a circumstance
which will cause you much distress. Mr. William
Champion, the acting master of the brig Britton,
has been shot through both his thighs, by a party of
Don Miguel's soldiers stationed on board the Ame-
rican whale-ship Galatea, on the evening of last
Sunday week, just after Don Miguel's squadron
weighed from this anchorage to go against Terceira.
The Galatea had also been detained by the blockad-
ing squadron, and was ordered to Lisbon ; and Mr.
Champion, wishing to put a letter on board of her
to England, to go via Lisbon, took a pa-sage off
with the American Captain. On getting alongside
the Galatea, the Portuguese soldiers ordered them
away, and they instantly steered towards shore ;
but the soldiers, notwithstanding this, fired into the
boat, wounded Champion dangerously, and also the
American mate, who steered the whale-boat. They
were taken immediately on shore, and medical as-
sistance procured. The ball was extracted from
Mr. Champion's right hip, and he is- now doing well,
and likely to recover."—Times.