The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-06-13
THE MORNING NEWS, SUNDAY, JUNE Is, 1897.


ing to older drinking as the many apple
orchards seen on every farm began to give
forth their bountful yield. Perhaps this
also was indirectly the influence of the
New England climate. Cider was soon so
cheap and plentiful that all could have
their NIL. In every well-to-do household
the cellar held what was known as the
Indian barrel. which was on free tap for
every stray Indian who CHANGED to pass
that way. Some tough old Indian squaws
ana sorry braves had regular round of
households for each day in the week, and
with liberal draughts from each cellar
managed to end every day in the year in
state of that blissful and motonless in
ebriety so beloved by the noble red man.
All drank cider, old and young Infants
in arms drank muled cider at night. a
beverage which would kill a modern babe
Old men began the day with a quart of
hard cider before breakfast Delicate wo-
men drank cider. The whole apple crop
was so devoted to the manufacture of CT
der that in the days of temperance re-
form, at the beginning of this century,
temperance zealots cut down whole or
chards of full-bearing trees. not conceiv-
ing any adequate use of the fruit for any
purpose save cider making.
The presses for cider making began to
be set up about the year 1850. MassaChus-
sets had ere that planted apple trees very
generally, and Henry Wolcott had plant
ed them at Windsor, IN the Connecticut
valley, and sold both trees and fruit be-
fore 1919. Apples were to shillings a
bushel; cider l shilling pence a gallon
as high priced as rum a century later.
Connecticut cider soon became famous
Roger Williams in 1860 says John Win
throps loving letter to him was as CRATE
full as "a cup Of your Connecticut cider"
BY 1879 it was cheap enough; 10 shillngs
a barrel. and In the year 100 about shil-
lings. II had then replaced beer innearly
all localities in New England in daily diet;
yet at the commencement dinner at Har-
ward i'm 1908 four barrels Of beer were
served, and one of cider and eighteen
gallons OF wine. Judge Sewall constantly
refers to cider drinking. BY this time IL
was cheaper by the barrel than was corn
or carrots.
In 1921 one village of forty families made
5000 barrels of cider, and Judge Joseph
Wilder of Lancaster, Mass, made GIG bar
rels in the year 172S
Metheglin was another drink universally
liked, yet not of large consumption as was
cider In the list of values fixed by the
Piscataqua planters a pound of beaver
paid for three gallons of metheglin In
the middle of the century it was worth 10
shillings a gallon in the Connecticut val
ley. II was kind of mead made of
water, honey and yeast; also sometimes Of
the fermented beans of the honey locust
All kinds of strong herbs were boiled In
water, and then the honey was added to
the strong decoction. ALE harme" then
was added, and the liquor fermented
Sometimes ginger cloves, cinnamon and
mace were boiled in it. 1t was very in
toXcating-as the old Druids found in their
carousals. We find records of arrest for
drunkenness through NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
James Howell said "Metheglin does
stupefy more than any other liquor If
a INN ,sle.vs, f,l.r 4 l.
in the brain"
Mead also was made from honey and
hops Beverage was a name applied to
various mild mixtures of weak cider with
water and various havorings. Perry was
made from pears, and peachy from
peaches, but not in any considerable guam
tity.
1t IS curious to note that in those days of
struggling. of pioneering, of comparative
.ack OF money, rare French Portuguese and
Spanish wines and brandes were found in
the virginia ordinaries in such plenty that
their rates of sale had to be fixed by law
To-day only the meanest and rankest
brands of whisky can be bought at a Vir-
GINA country tavern. Then Madeira
sack, sherry, Malaga, muscadine alicant
Fayal, palm wine, Rhenish wine and other
foreign wines were sold at inns. Gov
Harvey said in 1888 that half the tobacco
raised was thrown away in a superhuity of
wines and brandies. The massacre bv
the Indians in 1922 was gravely attributed
by the company in London to enormous
excuses in apparel and drinking"
To check exorbitant charges by inn
Keepers the rates were fixed in 1915, ac-
cordlng to "Hening's Statutes" at thirty
pounds of tobacco for a gallon Of Canary
Malaga, sherry, muscadne or alicant: for
Madeira and Fayal, twenty pounds: for
English spirits, eighty pounds; for bran
V. In 4
doubled. Ten years later still the prices
had again doubled, apparently, but in fact
tobacco was sliding scale of value and
prices also were given i'm hard money
Spanish and Portuguese wines and rum
were 10 shillings gallon which was
cheaper than they could be bought I'm
England at the same date; brandy Eng
lish spirits and Virginia drains. which
were apple and peach brandies, were 1e
shillings. In 1871 those latter were class
ed and priced along with the Spanish
wines.
In New England the consumption of
choice wines was also great, and the first
object OF foreign trade. The first shin
built in Boston-the marlborough back
from her first voyage. which was to Fa-
yal, IN 1913 load chiefly Of wine sugar
and cotton, which Through Gods bless
ing were thus plentiful and cheap IN
Boston. The next trip, TO Malaga, brought
DaSh spanish wines. zen years later when
the colonies seemed half-paralyzed by the
complete stoppage Of Immigration SIN
the wines OF the western Islands and OF
Portugal and Spain found ready pur-
chasers In Boston. In 1916 there was
great scarcity In wine" and the apostle
Eliot suggested an awakening Of the land
TO consider ye excesse yet hath here bene
that way" But In 1850 Johnson. in his
Wonderful Working Providence" saws
that wine and sugar were "ordinarilv
spent" more freely Ia Massachusetts than
In England"
But more than beer more than wine did
the colonists drink rum-and rum de-
serves a chapter by Itself.
Il .a-.-.-...