The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-04-05 00:00:00

SELECT EXTRACTS.

ROUNb TABLES.—We have said, that they sat at a round
table ; and we may here observe that circularity is an excel-
lent quality in a table when three persons are to sit at it, for
they can leave' equal spaces between each other, and thus
there will be no appearance of want of company, ,no unsocia-
bleness, no unsightly one-side minus an occupier, or one per-
son cut off from one another. How different wiih a quad-
rangular or parallelogramic table I"—From Davy Dreamy,
edited by Flit
BREAD ADULTERATED.—Ln large towns the goodness of
bread is judged of by its cohltir, and even the cheaper sorts
are required to be very white. Now unless the best flour is
used, bread cannot be made of such a colour without using
alum, which bleaches the flour, and thus giros to bread made
of inferior or damaged wheat the appearance of the better
quality. The quantity of this salt employed is comparatively
small ; but it is, notwithstanding, sufficient to induce consti-
pation in the weak, either very young or very old, and to ag-
gravate it when already existing ; persons thus circumstanced
should therefore abstain, as much as possible, from eating
bakers' bread, using in its stead home-made or brown bread.
—Curtis on " Tlie Preservation of Health."
WATER CRESS.—The grateful and salutary qualities of
this vegetable are too well known to need description ; but
at certain periods of the year, when perhaps the cress is in
its best state for the table, it is common for the under part
of the leaves to have a white gelatinous substance adhering
to them, which cannot be removed by washing ; and small
snails are also fixed on them. It may be useful to many to
learn, that if the cresses are put into a brine, made with com-
mon salt and water, and suffered to remain there ten minutes
or less, every thing of the animal or insect kind will be de-
tached from the haves, and the cresses can afterwards be
washed in pure water, and sent to table. Small salads, cab-
bages, cauliflower, brocoli, celery' lettuces, and vegetables of
all descriptions, by the same simple method, may be freed
from slugs, worms or insects. If a jar of brine is kept for
the purpose, and strained after being used, it will last many
weeks, and the expense, of course, be trifling.—Gardener's
Gazette.
A SWEDISH INN.—I put up at the Skyds-house at Orebro,
and I suppose it is in much the same state as in the days of
Gustavus Vasa. It is built round a court-yard, in which horses,
peasants, carts, boys, dogs, and travellers, with a few pigs,
and servant girls half undressed for heat, and scudding to and
from the kitchen; are mingled in glorious confusion. The
bed-room, however, which I got was much cleaner than I
expeeted : but for dinner I was referred to another house in
which people keep fiod but not beds for travellers, Here you
order a portion according to a carte, or list of dishes; but in
country towns the carte seldom tells of more than three sorts
of dishes, of which only one generally is of any sort of meat.
If you want any thing to drink, except it be anise brandy, or
ale, which in general is very good, you must go to a third
house, the kallare, or town's cellar, where you may get wine.
Should you want a dessert, you must go to a fourth, the con-
ditor's, or confectioner's, where you get pastry, coffee, and
liqueurs. The Swede come home at last to take his siesta,
which all classes enjoy as regularly as in Spain or laly, at this
season. The labouring people regularly sleep in the shade
for an hour or two ; and the middle classes go to bed after
dinner during the summer.—Laing's Travels.
THE NEW ART.—Mr. J. F. Havell and Mr. Willmore
(the engravers) have, by covering glass with etching ground
and smoke, sketched designs upon it. Through the glass
thus exposed by the scratches, the photogenic paper
receives the light ; and the design, which the sun may be
said to print, may be multiplied with perfect identity for ever.
Designs thus produced will probably become much more
common, and even more generally applicable, than lithogra-
phy, because all the means are more readily accessible ;
whilst it would receive it rank as an art, and be excellent in
proportion to the skill of the artist, as a draftsman with the
etching needle. The size need no longer be kept down by
that of the printing press, as the size of the glass can limit
the size of the design. This a real and valuable discovery,
applicable to a thousand purposes. It is reported that Mr.
Havell, and his brother, the well-known painter, have suc-
ceeded in giving some true colours, also to their productions,
by the action of light. Beautiful imitations of washed bistre
drawings may be produced, by stopping out the light on the
glass by black varnish, which will obstruct the transmission
of light in proportion to the thickness with which the var-
nish is laid 044. and specimens like fine mezzotinto prints
have been pro ,iced by this process.—Literary Gazette
THE DARTANELLES.—The Dardanelles is a little Turk-
ish town in tie narrowest and most beautiful part of the
straits : a strong fort, with enormous cannon, stands frown-
ing on each side. These are the terrible fortifications of
Mahommed 11. the keys of Constantiple. The guns are
enormous ; of'one in particular the muzzle is two feet three
, inches in diameter ; but with Turkish ingenuity, they are so
placed as to be'discharged when a ship is direct opposite. If
the ship is not idisabled by the first fire, and does not choose
to go back and: take another, she is safe. At every moment
a new picture presents itself : a new fort, a new villa, or the
ruins of an ancient city. A naked point on the European
side, so ugly, compared with all around it, as to attract par-
ticular attention, projects into the strait, and here are the
uint of Sestos ; here Xerxes built in his bridge of boats to
carry over his'millions to the conquest of Greece; and here,
when he returned with the wreck of his army, defeated and
disgraced, he found the bridge destroyed by the tempest,
and, in his rage, ordered the chains to be thrown into the
sea, and the waves to be lashed with rods. From this point,
too, Leander—swam the Hellespont for love of Hero, and
Lord Byron and Mr. Ekenhead for fun. Nearly opposite,
close to a Turkish fort, are the ruins of Abydos. Here
Xerxes and Leander, and -Lord Byron and Mr. Ekenhead,
landed.-LStephens's Incidents of Travel.
LAKE SANDFORD, NEAR.THe SOURCE OF THE HUDSON
RlVER.—Striking the outlet of Lake' Sandford, where it
flows through a forest of daik cedars, our luggage was shifted
from the buckboard, and' transferred -with outselves to a
canoe ; we embarked at the foot of a steep hill ; but our
course lay for some. time through low sviampy ground, where
the canoe could Sorhetimes with difficulty find a deep enough
channel throukh the sedge and water-lilies that by turns co-
vered the surface. This amphibious track, however, soon
disappeared where the hills again coming down to the edge of
the stream confined and deepened its current ; and now, after
a pull of a few hundred yards through a straight narrow pas-
saga, we launched out' upon the bosom of those beautiful
lakes with which this region abounds. Not a sign of a house
or a clearing, nor any mark of the handywork of man, was
to be seen anywhere, save in the rude shallop that bore us.
The morning was still and lowering. There was not breeze
enough to lift the fog from the mountains round. Every
rock and tree was reflected, with each leaf and wild flower,
however minute, in the glassy surface ; the islands, among
which we found our course, floated double ; the hermit-like
loon that glanced from beneath their embowering shelter,
and sent his wild cry with a dozen echoes far among the hills,
was the only object that moved or gave a sound of life
across the waters. We landed upon one islet, and I paused
to observe what I have never been tired of studying, the
manner in which nature effects her work of clothing the
barren crags with soil. Here, on this rocky islet, some fifty
feet in diameter, the whole process may be seen—the first
covering of moss and lichens ; the larger growth of the
same ; the light black soil that is formed from their decay ;
the taller plants that again, in succession, are doomed to die
and be decomposed, and afford earthly nourishment to the
first hardy forest growth—still, in its turn, to be succeeded
by softer woods—may all be traced upon Inch-Hamish.
Here, on this little spot, where you can run a stick some
three feet down through the primitive mosses that form the
first covering of the rock, you have also the towering spruce,
the ragged arbor-vitie, and several other hardy ever-green
varieties ; while a single delicate white ash has put forth its
decidious leaves, and hung its scariet berries over the lake.
An accomplished botanist has, I am told, found upwards of
a hundred varieties of plants and trees upon this islet, which
is less than an acre in extent. Cruising leisurely up the lake
in this way—pausing ever and anon to admire the change of
prospect as we wound round some green headland, or lying
upon our oars while trying the fine echoes which the moun-
tains gave back to our voices whenever our cout se lay far
from the margin—it was afternoon before we reached the

point for debarking, which we attained by piercing deep
within a forest that overshadows the inlet. One canoe left
cheerful lake, and, floating beneath the boughs of ancient
trees that sometimes interlaced above our heads, startled the
trout from the black pools which bathed the roots, and
grated at last upon a gravelly bank, where it was drawn up
and secured. Not far from this point, a portage of a few
hundred yards enables the hunter to launch again upon Lake
Henderson, and strike the first link in a chain of lakes which,
with a few more brief portages, will float his shallop all the
way to the St. Lawrence.—Hqffman's JVild Scenes in the
Forest.

ADULTERATION OF BEER.—Beer is the favourite beverage
of the immense majority, of the English people ; and if no
other ingredients were used in its composition than those
which the law permits—viz., malt and hops—it would be a
nourishing and wholesome, as well as favourite liquor. But
this unfortunately is not the case. Beer is mixed with a
large proportion of water, and a great number of drugs, more
or less deleterious, are employed to make the mixture resem-
ble genuine beer in its sensible qualities, at a smaller expense
than malt and hops can be obtained for. One of these in-
gredients is a composition of extract of quassia and liquorice
juice, which goes by the name of " multum," and is very
extensively employed. Of a worse description than this are
those adulterations which are intended to make the beer
heady, and thus to give weak liquor the appearance of strength.
For this purpose a variety of narcotics is used, such as cocu-
lus indicus, nux vomica, &c.. In addition to these several
other substances are employed in the adulteration of beer ;
for instance, sulphate of iron, wormwood, capsicum. &c. It
should be observed that the greater number of these illegal
adulterations are supposed to be perpetrated not by the
wholesale brewers, but by the publicans, who in many cases
retail the beer at a lower rate than they purchase it in whole-
sale. It is to be feared that, in spite of the numerous heavy
fines imposed upon persons found guilty of such practices.
they are still carried on to a considerable extent ; at least it
is difficult, if not impossible, in some parts of London, to
procure good genuine beer. I may mention, as a proof of
the extent to which the adulteration of beer is carried, that
there is a class of men called brewers' druggists, whose busi-
ness it is to prepare the compounds for brewers and publi-
cans. Ale is made of pale malt, and is frequently adulterated
with several of the articles used for porter, as well as with
opium, tobacco, grains of paradise, &c. Stale or sour ale is
converted into mild ale by the admixture of prepared chalk,
soda, or carbonate of potash ; and to give new all the appear-
ance of (* liquor, oil of vitriol is employed. Now there can
be no doubt that a beverage containing even minute quanti-
ties of such articles as those above enumerated, must be de-
trimental to health ; and as the law has hitherto proved un-
equal to the task of preventing their employment, all who
regard their health, especially invalids, should drink home-
brewed beer, or procure their porter direct from the brewers.
And here I cannot but observe that the abolition or reduction
of the malt duty would be a great boon to the community.
The inducements to adulterate malt liquors would thereby
be much diminished, and private persons would then be bet-
ter able to brew their own beer, and thus escape the hazard
of consuming what is frequently little better than a slow poi-
son. It has frequently been noticed of late that London
porter is becoming worse and worse ; yet we seldom hear of
convictions for the offence of adulteration. Some strenuous
measures ought to be forthwith adopted for the repression of
the evils in question.—Curtis on the Preservation of Health.
BITUMINOUS WOOD.—It appears by a communication in
a recent number of Silliman's Journal, that a large deposit
of bituminous wood has been discovered at Port Hudson-, on
the Mississippi river. The village is situated on a bluff sixty
or seventy feet high. This bluff reposes, as the whole country
does, on a thick bed of blue aluminous clay, which forms the
bed of most of our water courses, and wears very gradually
by the action of the water. The upper surface of the clay at
that place is considerably below the high water mark. " The
bluff has been long falling in from being undermined by
springs, which ran out above the blue clay, and by the action
of the current of the Mississippi ; but the blue clay does not
wear away near so fast, and for this reason it extends some
distance beyond the base of the bluff. It seems, that, upon
this shelf, the Mississippi has made a considerable deposit,
of the common kind, containing a great many fragments,
and sometimes entire logs. After this deposit took place,
a considerable mass of earth must have fallen, covering the
former one. The remarkably low water, together with the
removal of the superincumbent earth to form a new landing
place, has exposed the formation. The smallerlogs are often
entirely bituminized and changed into a glossy black coal, in
which no trace of fibre can be perceived. Still the formation
must be very recent ; for, in the most perfectly bituminized
pieces, there are frequent marks of the axe, looking as though
it were done but yesterday. The limbs are very much flat-
tened ; but otherwise their external appearance is the same
as usual in the species, which can easily be determined, being
oak, walnut, hickory, &c. The larger logs and fragments
have undergone the transformation in various degrees; some
being of a soft and spongy texture. Many are in a state of
perfect coal at one end, or on one side, and have undergone
no change except softening at the other."