Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/777

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its external furface from the contact of the air, which is very apt to corrupt or putrify it.

If this lee is intended to be kept many months, it will be very proper to fecure it by fprinkling the layers as they are packed up with a little brandy. The expencc of this is nothing, for the brandy is recovered again in the operation. The effential oil of any fermented fubffance is always found preferved in great quantity in the lee or fediment of the fer- mented liquor, and in regard to the diftilh'ng of thefe dry XVine lees, the great article is the feparating this oil to advantage. In order to this, the folid lee muft be fet to fteep in fix or eight times its own weight of water, ftirring the whole well together at times ; in this manner the liquor will take up all the lighter and better part of the lee, and will become thick and muddy, thecoarfer part of the cakes, which is of lefs va- lue, fubfidins; to the bottom. The thick liquor, without thefe lumps, is to be put into the common Hill, and the liquor worked off, as in the common way, by the cbemifts, to ob- tain the effential oils of plants. The frill mult be made hot and dewy before the liquor is put in, and the fire afterwards kept well regulated, otherwife there will be danger of burning ; but the better way to fecure it is to put fome loofe flicks at the bottom of the ftill.

The oil is thus brought over with the liquor, and is to befe- parated in the common way, by means of a feparating pot placed under the nofe of the worm ; but if this oil is defired to be obtained fine, the pot muft be fhifted foon, for, after a time, a grofs, reiinous, and much lefs agreeable oil, will mix itfelf with it, and cannot be feparated again without great trouble, and a fecond diftillation, and that will not fucceed without great care. Shaw's Eflay on Diftillery.

Ph'dofophic Spirit of Wine, in the writings of fome che- mifts and phyficians, a phrafe that often occurs as the name of a liquid prepared from Witie, and endued with very re- markable properties.

It is generally fuppofed that this was the fame fort of liquor which we at this time call by the name of Spirit of Wine ; but this is a very erroneous opinion, and has led many into errors, about the operations in which it was concerned. It was truly no diftilled liquor, but the fpirituous parts of Wine condenfed and concentrated by the freezing of the more aqueous part. See the article Concentrating of 'Wine, fupra.

Pricked Wines. Aneafy method of recovering- tricked Wines may be learned from the following experiment : Take a bot- tle of red port that is pricked, add to it half an ounce of tarta- rized fpirit of Wine, make the liquor well together, and fet it by for a few days, and it will be found very remarkably al- tered for the better.

This experiment depends upon the ufeful doctrine of acids and alkalies. All perfect Wines have naturally fome acidity, and when this acidity prevails too much, the Wine is faid to be pricked, which is truly a ftate of the Wine, tending to vine- gar: But the introduction of a fine alkaline fait, fuch as that of tartar, imbibed by fpirit o£ Wine, has a direct power of taking ofFthe acidity, and the fpirit of Wine alfo contributes to this, as a great prcfervative in general of Wines. If this operation be dexteroufly performed, pricked Wines may be abfolutely recovered by it, and remain faleable for fome time : And the fame method may be ufed to malt liquors juft turned four. Shaw's Lectures, p. 214.

Saffron Wine, Vinum Crocatum. Sec the article Saffron.

VfinE-Spirit, a term ufed by our diftillers, and which may feem to mean the fame thing with the phrafe fpirit of Wine ; but they are taken in very different fenfes in the trade. Spirit of Wine is the name given to the common malt fpirit, when reduced to an alcohol, or totally inflammable ftate ; but the phrafe Wine-fpirit is ufed to exprefs a very clean and fine fpirit, of the ordinary proof ftrength, and made in England from Wines of foreign growth.

The way of producing it is by fimple diftillation, and it is never rectified any higher than common bubble proof. The feveral Wines of different natures, yield very different propor- tions of fpirit ; but, in general, the ftrongeft yield one fourth, the weakeft in fpirits one eighth part of proof- fpirit ; that is, they contain from a fixteenth to an eighth part of their quan- tity of pure alcohol.

Wines that are a little four, ferve not at all the worfe for the purpofes of the diftiller, they rather give a greater vinofity to the produce. This vinofity is a thing of great ufe in the Wine- fpirit, whofe principal ufe is to mix with another that is tarta- rized, or with a malt-fpirit, rendered alkaline by the common method of rectification. All the Wine-fpirits made in England, even thofe from the French Wnes, appear very greatly dif- ferent from the common French brandy ; and this has given our diftillers a notion that there is fome fecret art practifed in France, for the giving the agreeable flavour to that fpirit; but this is without foundation. See the article Spirit. When we diftil Sicilian or Spanifh Wines, we do not produce Sicilian or Spanifh brandies ; and the true reafon of this is, that the Wines which they diftil on the fpot into brandy, are very different from thofe which they export as Wnes. Thofe they diftil are fo poor and thin, that they will not keep many months, nor can poflibly bear exportation. If we had in England thofe poor Wines 'they diftil into brandy near Bour- Suppv, V01. It,

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deaux, Cognac, or up the Loire, there is no doubt but the fpirit we made from them would be tmfverfally allowed to be French brandy. We have proof of this from fome of the Scotch diftiilsries, where they, with no peculiar art, or fecret method* procure from fome of the poor pricked and damaged Wines received there, brandy fo nearly refembling that of France, that a good judge will fcarce be able to make the di- stinction. Wine-fpirits and brandies therefore are the fame thing, only with this difference, that the former is the product of a rich Wtne, and the latter of a poor one ; or, at the ut- moft, they differ only as our two home products, the cyder- fpirit and the crab-fpirit do.

The Wine-fpirit, diftilled in England, is not eafy to be had pure and unmixed at our diftillers, nor under a price almoft equal to that of French brandy ; fo that ir it ever be required out of the trade, it is as well to ufe the French brandy, which will, in all cafes, ferve the fame purpofes, unlefs where a high flavour or a" copious effential oil are required. All other fpirits are carefully divefted of their oil in the rectifica- tions ; but the Wine-fpirit is coveted only for its oil, and all that can be obtained is preferved in this, its principal ufe being to give a flavour to a worfe fpirit, and to cover the tafte of a difagreeable oil in it.

When a cafk of Wine chances to turn four in private hands, it is worth while to diftil it for the fpirit. The lees alfo, if in any confiderable quantity, will yield fuch a proportion of the fame fort of fpirir, as to render it worth while ; and as the high flavour is not required in this intent, it will be beft to draw off the fpirit very gently, either by the cold or hot ftill, and afterwards it may be rectified without any addition, and reduced to the ftandard ftrength of proof. It thus makes a very clean and pleafant fpirit, though very different from the brandy from the fame country whence the Wine came. Shaiv's Eflay on Diftillery. See the article Spirit.

Wiuz-Fly, in natural biftory, the name of a fmall black fly, found in empty Wne-ca(ks, and about Wine-\ees, and called by the Latins, bibio. •

It is produced of a fmall red worm, very common in the fedi- ment of Wine. See the article Bibio.

The drippings of Wine or beer-veffels, the preftings of the JVme or cyder-prefs, the pots in which honey has been kept, and in which a little remains fticking to the fides, and turning four, all afford vaft numbers of a fmall fpecies of worm or mag- got. This is of a white colour, and has two hooks placed near the head; in ffiort, it refembles, in all the parts, the maggot of the common flefh-fly. Multitudes of thefe fmall creatures live and move very briflcy about in thefe fubftances for feveral weeks together ; but at the end of that time, when they have arrived at their full growth, they enter into the nymph ftate under a covering or cafe made of their own ikin, which dries, and becomes of a brown colour. After eight or nine days in this ftate, the cafe is opened by the falling off of a fmall piece at the end, and the fly makes its way out. The fly is extremely fmall when its wings are not extended. It does not exceed the fize of the head of a middling pin; it is however very beautiful ; the breaft and body are yellow, the reticulated eyes are red, and the wings have all the rainbow- colours. The beft way of procuring thefe little flies, which make a very beautiful microicopic object, is to keep the mat- ter, in whicii the worms are placed, in a glafs, covered down with a paper ; as foon as the cover is taken off, at the time of their being in the fly-ftate, they rife up at once in the form of a cloud ; enough of them for obfervation will however re- main about the fides of the veffel. When examined, they are found to have all the regular parts of the larger flies ; their antenna; are oval and flatted, and their legs, and every other part, are as elegantly perfect, as they are feen to be in the moft elegant large fly.

It is not known whether they are oviparous or viviparous ; but this is to be obferved, that they give us great light into the origin of animalcules in different fluids. Thefe are a fpecies of winged infect, fo fmall as fcarce to be vifible as they fly, and to thefe we owe the worms in the four fubftances before- defcribed, though we know not how or when they depofit them there. Thefe maggots or worms are of the number of thofe animals, fuppofed by the vulgar to be produced of cor- ruption. Snce we fee in thefe the evident courfe of nature in their origin, what prevents but that there may be numbers of flies yet fmaller than thefe, whofe eggs may be depofited in the fluids in which we find our microicopic animalcules. Reau- mur's Hift. Inf. vol. 9. p, 81.

WING, [Cycl.) — Wings, among the fly-clafs, afford feveral fubordinate distinctions of the genera of thofe animals, under the antient general claffes.

Several fpecies of flies, while they are in a ftate of reft, or only walking, fhew feveral regularly diftinct manners of carrying their Wings. The much greater number, however, carry them in a parallel or plain pofition. Among thofe who carrv them thus, fome have them in form of a fort of oars, their direction being perpendicular to the length of the body, which is not at all covered by them. This is the cafe in many of the libella?, and of the tipulae.

Others carry their Wings in this manner, fo as that they cover

a- part of the body, without at all covering one another.

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