The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-07-26

ance on the part of the compounder. By taste or smell, 1t Is impossible to distinguish wood alconol from the pure grain product. Even in the plicated process Is necessary to tell one from the other.
 Many cases of wood alcohol pois- oning probably have been due to the fact that a bootlegger or manufac- turer of synthetic liquor used wood more quickly and more violently than those of the moonshiner or the re6istiller oi denatured alcohol.
 Just Pure Wood Alcohol!
 Samples have come into the Wash ineton laboratory so perfectly simu- lating rye and Scotch whisky that neither by sight nor smell could the difference be detected. Yet they an alyzed only wood alcohol, plus col bring and flavoring. It is almost inconceiVable that any man deliber- ately would make such concoction. The inference is that the makers used wood alcohol in the belief that it was grain alcohol, or. at the worst, redistilled denatured alcohol
 There are in the record a few in- stances of deliberate poison mixing. but here again the mixer apparenay did not expect the purchaser to drtnN the product The mixer made, ap- parently, something to sell only on sight, but to be detected as fraud by small or, failing that, certainiy on touching the lips. There are III the laboratory samples of whisky which are nothing cut water colored with iodine. Bearing the labels or popular old brands, their appearance would deceive even the distller or those brands.
 While the great bulk of Illicit iS distilled, with wines and beers play ing a decidedly minor part there are however, some home brews and some wines on the market which contribute to the adulterated supply of intoX- icating drink.
 Home brewing appears to be dylng A natural death. Many persons who tried 1t have found that, without adequate brewery equipment they cannot make anything fit to drink Such brews, however as are on the market for the most part are ln- furious. Conditions under which they are made generally are such as to render it impossible to control fer mentation. Wild yeast and filth add their poisons.
 Wine From Rotten Grapes.
 Considerable quantities of wine are made and sold illegally, particularly
 
 the large cities of the northern states, from rotten grapes Wine making of this sort is done usually under unsan- itary conditions, The product has so poor an appearance (unless il Is doe | tored) that few will buy 1t. Per mangAnate of potash, vioiant | poison. often is added to give thls ] stuff the color of real grape wine.
 Poison liquor long has been drunk as a beverage. In this country its trail runs back to pioneer days. The 1 fire water" with when the irrespon
 slbIe trader started the Indians on the
 war path probably did not differ
 materially from the so-called gin 1 which melted unfortunate negroes 10 | frenzied outrage and put the south
 in the vanguard of prohibition,
 Delerum tremens was the after math of real liquor in its day The
 aftermath of bootleg liquor often Is
 a stupefaction following hard on the 1 heels of frenzy. IL may bring loss oi ! sensation even while consciousness l remains The records reveal the case ! of man who, wild from synthetic ! liquor Supposedly smuggled goods, l had a broken leg set without taking an anesthetic. So completely had thu
 liquor henumbed sensation that ht l felt no pain.
 From all parts of the country hay,
 come reports of after-effects ot boot ] lrg liquor more weird than deleriun
 tremens Sometimes the victim pre-
 fers death to the agony and, witt i losing consciousness, takes his owl | life X young actress, for instance i who killed herself in her dressing l room in q Washington theatre, live long enough to say that the effects 0