1827 Wine and spirit adulterators unmasked

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sufficient weight, to induce many to apply where the genuine article is sold at a moderate price, a more effectual stop, would be put to this most un- justifiable system, than could, perhaps, be done by any other method whatever. Should it be urged, in reply to these facts, by any of the class to whom what I have here stated applies, that I have divulged secrets which ought strictly to have been confined to the Trade, 1 an- swer, that by no honest Wine Merchant (such an one, who makes the quality and genuineness of his goods, and the moderation of his prices, the test of his respectability), are the different materials for adulterating, and the method of their application, with which he may have become acquainted, from long intercourse with all classes of Dealers, con- sidered by any means secrets, either as belong- ing to the trade, or worth the keeping; and al- though, the reasons which induce me to publish this Treatise anonymously, will be better esti- mated, by those in the trade, or, who are more inti- mately acquainted with the description of people, from whose guilty practises I have removed the veil, yet, as to all persons, in a greater or less de- gree, it must be evident, that in an open discussion, in which the class alluded to, have nothing to lose, but a source of profit unworthy of honest men, and which, besides, is calculated, whether as a means of conveying fresh advertisements of their pre- tensions to the Public, as an extra opportunity for