1827 Wine and spirit adulterators unmasked

76 Gin-shop and Wholesale cheap Wine venders, that the Full Quarts are in more general use for Spirits, and that the remaining sizes, with but very few exceptions indeed, are purchased by the respect- able Wine Merchant, the Wine Cooper, and those of the Gin-shop-keepers, who serve, as they would be served. Leaving, however, in the hands of my Readers, the many inferences that may be drawn from this plan of defrauding the Public, of their fair and reasonable measure,* I will now commence as to the adulterations of PORT WINE. The most usual mode of adulterating this Wine, may be said to consist, in admixing with whatever on this subject of short measure, with regard to bottles, it may not be amiss to mention a circumstance relating to a part of the profits of many of our modern Gin-shop-keepers, arising from a mode they have of cheating their poor dram- drinkers, out of their fair allowance of Gin, &c. It bespeaks the state of refinement, to which their ingenuity has arrived, in this re- The means by which a certain additional profit is obtained, is technically called in the trade ' by the turn of the glass,' and may be thus explained. * In treating spect, and the fact is, of itself, not a little curious.

The glasses made use of for the poor peo- ple, to drink their Spirits from, are shaped thus; the counter of the bar is covered with lead, perforated with holes, having a com- munication with a 'cask. Now as for ob- vious reasons, the glasses, although scarcely holding the measure when filled to the brim, are seldom so filled, at least to within