Argument of the Brewers for Legislative Discrimination in Favor of Ale and Lager-Beer: Delivered Before the Joint Special Committee of the Massachuset, Rueter Henry H.

In order to point out the difference between fermented and distilled liquors, I will sketch the process of manufacture of ale and beer in its salient points. The process of brewing is simple enough, although it requires skill and experience to carry it out successfully. Brewing and baking are similar in some respects. You know when a baker intends to make a batch of bread, he stirs a ferment which, after some hours, is thickened with flour, and by the addition of water is made into what is technically called the sponge. This is kept in a warm place, when fermentation sets in. The result of this fermentation is carbonic acid, whereby a portion of the starch of the flour is converted into sugar and then into alcohol. It is then baked and a well-baked loaf is composed of an infinite number of cellules, filled with carbonic acid gas. It is this which gives the light, elastic, porous constitution of bread. It has been supposed that by the heat of baking the alcohol formed was wholly expelled, but recent experiments indicate that a perceptible amount of alcohol, amounting to one-third of one per cent in weight, still remains in yeast-raised bread after baking it is much less in stale bread.

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