Page:A Practical Treatise on Brewing (4th ed.).djvu/244

228 the effects of an agent, which we have reason to consider, not only influential in producing variations in the operations of the brewery, but, what is still more important, variations in the constitution of our atmosphere, and probably effects on the functions of life, the comprehension of which may aid us, both in the prevention, and better treatment of epidemic and contagious diseases.

We may observe, that brewers cannot too carefully avoid the circumstances calculated to produce electro-chemical action, pointed out by Mr. Black; for it cannot be doubted, from the proofs he adduces, that local galvanic action is produced by the use of metallic cocks and chains of pipes, which, being acted upon by the wort, cause unsoundness.

Although the subject of electricity, as connected with brewing, has already been pretty fully treated of in the former part of this work, yet as electricity and electro-chemical action, as connected with fermentation, are at last beginning to attract a little more attention than they have hitherto done, a few additional remarks upon the subject may not be deemed superfluous. They will tend further to show the extraordinary influence exercised by that still incomprehensible fluid or body, not only upon fermentation but upon everything connected with the manufacture of beer, and also, as it is now thought, upon every process, both natural and