Page:Once a Week, Series 1, Volume II Dec 1859 to June 1860.pdf/411

 398 but vinegar and catsup coloured—with what do you think?”

“Can’t tell.”

“Minute chips of charred deal!”

“Come,” I interposed, “after all these disagreeables, allow me to recommend you one of these sweetmeats. What will you have?—a mutton chop, a rasher of bacon, or an oyster all done in sugar—or here’s a cock coloured to the life.”

“Charming bird, certainly; and so you recommend this cock for a delicate stomach?”

“Well, drop it in your pocket, and I dare say one of the little Routitouts will not make wry faces about it.”

“Won’t they! I think I know something about this amiable bird. Look at his bright yellow beak—well, that’s only chromate of lead, and those blood-red wattles—there is nothing more injurious in their colour than vermilion. Those beautiful stripes of yellow on the wings are gamboge, and the verdant stand on which he is strutting is arseniate of copper, or Scheele’s green—three deadly poisons and a drastic purge! Perhaps now you would like one of your younkers to have a suck at this game pullet?”

“Not so bad as that, old fellow!” I replied, furtively dropping out of my pocket a coloured bonbon intended for the little one at home. “A slight indigestion, perhaps, that a dose of grey-powder would put to rights in a day.”

“I am very glad you mentioned grey powder—mercury and chalk that should be; for, let me tell you, you may find the remedy worse than the disease.”

“Why, do you know, sir,” he said, raising his voice, “that they sometimes make this infantile remedy out of the scrapings of looking-glasses?”

“And what are the scrapings of looking-glasses composed of?”

“Why, an amalgam of tin, antimony, and arsenic, as a foil for the mercury. They sell this abominable stuff at 8d. a-pound, and if you happen to buy grey powder in a low neighbourhood, you stand a very good chance of getting some of it. Not content with poisoning and loading our food with all sorts of indigestible rubbish, they next proceed to adulterate the drugs we depend upon to cure us.”

“Well, upon my word,” said Bob, “here we’ve been jollifying at this elegant déjeûner à la fourchette, and eating all the delicacies of the season, when in comes this learned wretch and turns it all into gall and wormwood. Let us see what we’ve really taken. Why, there’s a whole paint-box of paints to begin with—Prussian blue, turmeric, bole armenian—”

“Stop a bit,” cried old Routitout, “those preserves look very red,—there’s cochineal in them; put down cochineal.”

“Very well, cochineal,—blue, yellow, red and scarlet,—four coats of paint for delicate stomachs.”

“Now, then, for the minerals; sulphur in the sulphuric acid, lead in my friend’s rappee.”

“Stop a minute,” eagerly interposed Routitout, “again let me examine the knife,” and rushing to the pickle-jar he triumphantly returned, “Copper! I told you so—look at the coating on the knife. Copper, by jingo!”

“Very well,—lead, copper.”

“And if any of you had happened to have sweetened your tooth with that cock of magnificent plumage, there would have been an addition of mercury and arseniate of copper, a pretty metallic currency to put into your blood’s circulation with your breakfast, and then for a gentle alterative to-morrow morning—antimony, mercury, and arsenic, alias grey powder, would be likely to set matters right with a vengeance,” and old Routitout laughed a demoniac laugh, “and, stop a bit, you have not done yet—there’s lime in the eggs, sand in the sugar, horse-blood in the coffee, and, perhaps, mahogany saw-dust; just throw these little items in to make it ‘thick and slab. ”

“Bob,” said I, turning very briskly upon our tormentor, “let’s wash our mouths out with a glass of beer.”

“Here’s to you,” he said, watching with his clear blue eye the ‘beaded bubbles winking at the brim.’

“I dare say now you think that fine head is a recommendation to your tipple. The author of a practical treatise on brewing, however, lets us into a secret; the heading, he tells us, is a mixture of half alum and half copperas ground to a fine powder, and is so-called for giving to porter and ales the beautiful head of froth which constitutes one of its peculiar properties, and which landlords are so anxious to raise to gratify their customers. That fine flavour of malt is produced by mixing salts of steel with cocculus indicus, Spanish liquorice, treacle, tobacco, and salt.”

“But there’s nothing of the kind in pale ale,” I replied.”replied. [sic]

“Well,” said he, in a half-disappointed tone, “they used to take about strychnine, though I believe that’s all bosh, but you can’t deny the camomiles.”

“But what’s the use of disenchanting us in this way, if tradesmen are all robbers together?” I inquired. “What remedy have we?”

“That’s just the thing the House of Commons at this very moment are trying to give you. Mr. Scholefield’s bill on the adulteration of food, which was originally intended to hit the adulterator very hard, is emasculated enough, for fear of interfering with trade; but there will be some protection for the intelligent classes, it is true. Any article suspected of being adulterated, may be publicly analysed, and if found to be sophisticated, the guilty party will be liable to a fine: this will lead to the better class of tradesmen warranting their goods as pure, and the middle and upper classes will, in the end, reap the benefit of Dr. Hassall’s investigations, and Mr. Scholefield’s bill—but as for the poor, God help them! They pay dear for what they have, and never, by any chance, have it pure; and as they can’t afford to have suspected articles analysed, they must go to the wall, as of old. We want a little touch of French despotism in these matters. Every drop of milk brought into Paris is tested at the barriers by the lactometer, to see if the ‘Iron-tailed cow’ has been guilty of diluting it—if so, the whole of it is remorselessly thrown into the gutter—the Paris milk is very pure in consequence. If a tradesman adulterates any