1827 Wine and spirit adulterators unmasked

Champagnes may be ranked,) for rendering bright such as have turned foul or ropy, or for preventing the increase of any ascescent quality which a Wine may have acquired, has been so frequently noticed in previous publications, that, perhaps, any length- ened discussion of its merits may be deemed super- fluous. In Accum's Culinary Poisons (page 95) this article is mentioned ; he says, * The most dangerous adulteration of Wine, is by some pre- paration of Lead, which possesses the property of stopping the progress of ascescence of Wine, and also of rendering White Wine, when muddy, transparent ; I have good reason to state that Lead is certainly employed for this purpose ; the effect is very rapid, and there appears to be no other method known of rapidly recovering ropy Wines. Lead, in whatever state it be taken into the stomach, occasions terrible diseases ; and Wine, adulterated with the minutest quantity of it, be- comes a slow poison.' In Watson's Chemical Essays, (vol. 8, page 369,) it is stated, ' That a method of adulterating Wine, with Lead, existed at one time, so generally, in Paris, as to have be- come quite a common practise/ In Medical Essays, (vol. 2, page 80,) the consequences of the use of this ingredient is related, in the case of thirty-two persons, having severally become ill, after drinking White Wine, that had been adul- terated with Lead, and, also, that one of them be- came paralytic, and another died. In Grahame's