Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 12.djvu/58

 NOTES AND QUERIES. D* * *" J ' 1S - w '

BIBCH-SAP WINE.

(9 th S. xi. 467.)

"THE right way of making birch- wine" is told by J. Worlidge in his ' Treatise of Cider, third ed., 1691, pp. 173-6, where also may be found a list of other home-made "British wines " of that time. See also Philips's poem 4 Cyder,' book ii. A Yorkshire farmer in 1711 mentions the making of it as a usual thing ( Yorkshire Archaeological Journal^ vii. 57). The Rev. John Berridge used it in 1790 (' Works,' 1864, p. 436). It is briefly noticed already in the fruit-growing and market-gardening dis- tricts of Worcestershire fermented liquors are commonly made at this present time from parsnips, rhubarb, and plums, also grape wine from out-of-door grapes. In Yorkshire I was familiar with nettle beer, but many people looked upon it as medicinal.
 * N. & Q.,' 2 nd S. vi. 8, 159; 5 th S. iii. 434. In

W. C. B.

N. Bailey, in his 'English Dictionary,' 1759, seventeenth ed., states : "Where these Trees [birch] are in Plenty the People tap them and make a very pleasant wine of the liquor." Charles Annandale, in his 'Imperial Dictionary,' writes, under * Birch-water ' :

" The juice of the birch, obtained, often in con- siderable quantities, by boring the stems of birch trees in early spring, when the sap is rising. It con- sists chiefly of sugar with nitrogenous substances. Fermented it forms an effervescent wine, drunk in the Ham, Courland, Livonia, &c."

EVERARD HOME COLEMAN. 71, Brecknock Road.

Other " home-made wines " not made from berry or fruit are primrose wine, coltsfoot wine, comfrey wine, turnip and parsnip wines, walnut wine, sweet basil wine, (?) eschalot wine, and no doubt many others. Was not Mistress Jane making elder-flower wine when the laird of Cpckpen called 1 Birch wine, made from the juice of the birch tree, boiled and fermented, is said in Red- ding's work on ' Wines ' to be still used in Norway. B. L. R. C., perhaps, does not desire a list of home-made wines made from fruit in which the flowers of certain plants only form an ingredient; otherwise there is Kentish wine, in which hops are used : Maitrank (May drink), made from cham- pagne, sauterne, and still and sparkling nocks, in which the flowers and leaves of the woodroof (or woodruff) are used; and heather beer, which Dr. R. C. Maclagan has shown could not be made from heather-blossom alone, which probably only acted as. a

flavouring matter hops. J-

lean remember this wine being made by boring a hole in the birch tree and running off the sap by means of a tube; and at the present Umefl believe, the practice is common enough in the Highlands of Scotland. Tom Warton, in his poem the 'Progress of Dis- content,' written in 1746, thus alludes to the practice :

To make his character entire He weds a Cousin of the bqmre; Not over weighty in the Purse, But many Doctors have done worse : And though she boasts no Charms divine, Yet she can carve and make Birch Wine. The poem, unsigned, may be found in the 1 Oxford Sausage.' My copy is undated, but probably was published about 1773, and contains very rude woodcuts.

JOHN PICKFORP, M.A. Newbourne Rectory, Woodbridge.

A " home-made wine " is manufactured in this neighbourhood from dandelion blossoms. FRANCIS R. RUSHTON.

Betchworth GlLLYGATE AT YORK (9 th S. xi. 406, 457,

518). I am utterly at a loss to know what I have done to make your correspondent regard me so scornfully that he will not even allow me to be a Scotchman. I do not remember that the thought of race ever crossed my mind when I took the trouble of penning a reply to his query; and as for his name, I will avoid mentioning it any more for fear of having my taste again aspersed. I did my best to set him right about Gilly- gate, and then made bold to ask whether the etymology he favoured had any foundation more stable than assonance. I am strengthened in the belief that it has not. The references to Guicciardini, 'Quentin Durward,' to a Scotch attempt to pronounce July, and to a gala which is held somewhere or other in June, seem to lack the relevance which might make them valuable. Your correspondent may be quite right as to the age of the bricks in Gillygate, but he should know that many a street is centuries older than its houses. Other points might be noticed; but I stay my hand with the remark that probably no one is more unconscious than our tiro of the humour that permeates his concluding paragraph. ST. SWITHIN.

" FOLKS " (9 th S. xi. 369, 438, 470). If I had referred to Edwards as an authority on words there would be some point in PROF. $KEAT' remark, but as I did not there is