Chapter VII (1)

“The Almaynes with their smale Rhenish wine are contented; but we must have March beere, double beere, dagger ale, and bracket . . .” _Gascoygne’s Delicate Dyet for Daintie-Mouthed Droonkards._

Alum si fit stalum non est malum Beerum si fit clerum est sincerum. _Old Rhyme._

_VARIOUS KINDS OF ALES AND BEERS.—SOME FOREIGN BEERS. — RECEIPTS. — SONGS. — ANECDOTES._

An attempt to describe, or even to specify, all the ales and beers that have gained a local or more wide-spread fame, would be a lengthy task. Nearly every county in England, and nearly every town of any size, has been at one time or another noted for its malt liquors. The renown of some localities has been evanescent, having depended probably upon the special art of some “barmy” brewer or skilful ale-wife, whilst of others it may be said that years only increase their fame and spread their reputation.

From a perusal of those queer old collections of quackery, magic, herb-lore and star-lore, the Saxon Leechdoms, it may be gathered that our Saxon ancestors brewed a goodly assortment of malt liquors. They made beer, and strong beer; ale, and strong ale; clear ale, lithe (clear) beer; and _twybrowen_, or double-brewed ale, the mighty ancestor of the “doble-doble” beer of Elizabethan times. Besides all these, there was foreign ale for those whose tastes were too fastidious to be satisfied with their native productions. {152}

On the authority of the _Alvismál_, it may be said that no distinction was originally drawn between ale and beer, except, perhaps, that the latter was considered to be a somewhat more honourable designation; “öl heitir meth mönnum en meth Asum bjoor” (_i.e._, ale it is called among men, and among the gods beer).

The _Exeter Book_, a collection of Anglo-Saxon poems, contains the expressions, “a good beer-drinker,” “angry with ale,” “drunken with beer,” in close juxtaposition and apparently without any distinction of meaning. A distinction must, however, have arisen in very early times, for in the collection of Saxon Leechdoms, mentioned above, a direction is to be found that a patient is on no account to drink beer, although he may partake in moderation of ale and wine; and the same work contains the remarkable and apparently impossible statement that while a pint of ale weighs six pennies more than a pint of water, a pint of beer weighs twenty-two pennies less than a pint of water.

The word beer seems gradually to have given place to the word ale, and though the former may have lingered in some parts of the country, and the passage from _King Horn_ already quoted shows that in the thirteenth century it was not quite forgotten—ale became the usual word to express malt liquor. It was English _ale_ that strengthened the arm of English bowmen at Crecy and Poictiers, and on many another well-fought field; and English _ale_ was the “barley-broth” which “decocted” the cold blood of the dwellers in this land of fogs and mist “to such valiant heat” and stubborn endurance in their constant struggles with the valour and chivalry of France.

The old English word “beor,” indeed, had become so weakened and specialised, even as early as the tenth century, that it is to be found in a Vocabulary of that date as an equivalent for idromellum, a word properly signifying an inferior sort of mead, but also denoting the sweet wort, before fermentation had changed it into _ale_. It is curious to observe that when next the word “beer” came into common use in our language, it was by introduction of our neighbours the Flemings, and was specially applied to malt liquor in which the bitter of the hop was an important ingredient. The word left us in sweetness, it returned in bitterness, and so the whirligig of time brings in its revenges. Beer became the name for hopped ale, but that distinction soon began to be less significant, for as early as 1616 we find Gervase Markham, in his _Maison Rustique_, recommends the use of a small quantity of hops in ale-brewing. {153}

Taylor, in _Drink and Welcome_, dwells upon this distinction between ale and beer in the seventeenth century as follows:—“Now to write of Beere I shall not need to wet my pen much with the naming of it, it being a drinke which Antiquitie was an _Aleien_ or a meere stranger to, and as it hath scarcely any name, so hath it no habitation, for the places or houses where it is sold doth still retain the name of an Alehouse. This comparison needs a _Sir Reverence_ to usher it, but being Beere is but an Upstart and a Foreigner or Alien, in respect of _Ale_, it may serve instead of a better; Nor would it differ from Ale in anything, but onely that an Aspiring _Amaritudinous_ Hop comes crawling lamely in, and makes a Bitter difference betweene them, but if the Hop be so crippled, that he cannot be gotton to make the oddes, the place may poorely bee supply’d with chopp’d Broome (new gathered) whereby Beere hath never attained the sober Title of _Ale_, for it is proper to say _A Stand of Ale_, and a _Hoggeshead of Beere_, which in common sense is but a swinish phrase or appellation.”

That curious ballad entitled _Skelton’s Ghost_, which was probably the work of a rhymer of the seventeenth century, points to the same distinction. The ghost of Skelton the Laureate is supposed to be addressing some of the jovial characters of the period much in the tone of one who, having lived in the golden age (of liquor), looks down with pity and scorn at a later-day’s degenerate topers. These are the particular lines in point:—

For in King Harry’s time When I made this rhyme * * * * * Full Winchester gage We had in that age The Dutchman’s strong beere Was not hopt over here, To us ’twas unknowne; Bare ale of our owne, In a bowle we might bring, To welcome the King.

At the present day, in the eastern counties, and indeed over the greater portion of the country, _ale_ means strong, and _beer_ means small malt liquor; in London _beer_ usually means porter (_i.e._, the small beer of stout); while in the west country _beer_ is the “mighty” liquor, and _ale_ the small. In the trade, however, _beer_ is the comprehensive word for all malt liquors. {154}

Ale was not the only word employed in late Saxon times to signify the “oyle of barly,” for _wœt_, from the Saxon _swatan_, was in common use as a synonym, and now, perhaps, finds its representative in the slang phrase, “heavy wet.” The same term lingers in Scotland, and lovers of Burns will remember his line, “It gars the _swats_ gae glibber doun.” In former times wheat and oats were malted, as well as barley, and though, as has been previously stated (p. 105), the law from time to time prohibited this use of wheat, as tending to enhance the price of bread, the practice was stronger than the precept, and continued to prevail down to a comparatively recent date.

Cogan, in _The Haven of Health_ (1586), thus describes the effect of the different malts on the resultant liquor:—“For beere or ale being made of wheat inclineth more to heat, for wheat is hot. If it be made of barley malt, it enclineth more to cold, for barley is cold. And if it be made of barley and otes together it is yet more temperate and of less nourishment.” In the reign of Edward VI. even beans were used in brewing, for the Brewers’ Company, in a petition to the Common Council asking for a revision of the prices of ale and beer, complain that the articles they use in brewing, viz., “wheate, malte, oates, beanes, hoppes . . . . . . at these days are comen unto greate and exceeding pryces.”

It has been shown that for several hundred years the prices and qualities of ale were fixed by law. As a rule, only two kinds were allowed to be brewed for sale, the better and the second, or, as they were called in some places, and notably in London, the double and the single. The prices in Henry III.’s reign for the better kind were fixed at 1d. for two gallons sold within cities, and 1d. for three or four gallons sold in country places. In Edward III.’s reign three sorts of ale might be brewed, the best at 1½d. a gallon, the middling at 1d., and the third at three farthings; and these prices seem to have been in force in the City of London with slight variations down to the time of Henry VIII., when the Brewers upon several occasions stirred themselves to get the prices raised, but met with varying success. In the early part of the reign the retail price of the best ale was still 1½d. the gallon, and of the second, called threehalfpenny ale, 1d. per gallon. Double beer was to be 1d. per gallon, and single ½d. and a half-farthing. The wholesale price for beer was also fixed, and three kinds were allowed, viz., “Dobyll” at 15d. the kilderkin, “Threehalfpenny” at 12d., and “Syngyll” at 10d.

In the twenty-fourth year of Henry VIII. the Brewers, after much agitation, got the prices of beer raised to 2s. the kilderkin for the “doble,” {155} and 1s. for the “syngyll”; but even with that they were not satisfied, and expressed their dissatisfaction in protests to the Common Council, who listened to their complaint, “but after long consideration it was agreed, that whereas the Serjeaunt Gybson hath exhibited and rote a boke of the gaynes of the said bere-brewers,” their case should be remitted to the care of a committee appointed to look into it. In the result no alteration was then sanctioned, but five years afterwards the price was raised to 3s. 4d. the kil. for the best, and 2s. 8d. for the threehalfpenny. The strength of ale usually brewed about this time may be judged from answers given by London brewers when interrogated on the subject. John Sheffield, on being asked (36 Henry VIII.) how many kilderkins of _good ale_ he draws from a quarter of malt, answers, “Little above five.” Other brewers say much the same thing, though Richard Pyckering evades the question by saying that “he commytteth the whole to his wife, and what she draweth from a quarter he knoweth not.” This would point to an ale of very considerable strength. In the thirty-seventh year of Henry VIII., another committee was appointed to consider this all-important question, “on account of the grete derthe and scarcitye at this present of all kinds of grayne;” but nothing resulted from their deliberations. The Brewers, however, seem to have stuck to their text with great pertinacity, and in the fifth year of Edward VI. obtained a decision of a committee of the Common Council, that they could no longer supply the City at the then existing prices. Two kinds of beer only are to be allowed, our old friends, “doble” and “syngyll,” and the strength and quality are defined as follows: “Of every quarter of grayne that any beare-bruer shall brewe of doble beare, he shall drawe fowre barrells and one fyrkyn of goode holsome drynke for mannes bodye,” and double that quantity of single beer. The price of the double beer is to be 4s. 8d. the barrel, and of single beer 2s. 4d., until the price of malt is reduced to 15s. the quarter, and of wheat to 12s., when the old prices are to be revived. Little variations of price occurred until the reign of Elizabeth, who seems, from contemporary accounts, to have been frequently exercised by the behaviour of the London Brewers. In a Royal proclamation of the second year of her reign, she complains that the Brewers have left off brewing any single beer, but brew “a kynde of very strong bere calling the same doble-doble-bere which they do commenly utter and sell at a very greate and excessyve pryce,” and orders the old rules and rates to be observed; and in particular that every Brewer shall once a week brew “as much syngyl as doble beare and more.” Twenty years later the “doble-doble” seems to have been {156} sanctioned in practice if not in name, for the Brewers are ordered to sell two sorts of beer only, the double at 4s. the barrel and “the other sort of beare of the best kynde at 7s. 6d.”

Three years later still the Queen declares that the disorders of the Brewers, through their “ungodly gredyness,” have grown to such lengths that something must be done; and an Act of Common Council brings back the beer to double and single, and applies other remedies.

In 1654 three sorts of beer are allowed—the best at 8s. the barrel, the second at 6s., and the small at 4s.; and shortly afterwards a fourth kind was added at 10s. The efforts of the authorities to fix the prices of ale and beer by arbitrary means were not long afterwards finally discontinued.

The limitation and classification of ale and beer according to their strength, was maintained down to quite recent times because of the duties laid upon them, but on the repeal of those duties ales of every strength, kind and description were, and have since been, extensively manufactured. Every want, whim, and fancy of the ale-drinker may now be gratified. There is old Scotch or old Burton for the lover of strong beer, porter for the labouring classes, stout for the weakly, and last, but far from least, that splendid liquid, pale ale, which, when bottled, vies with champagne in its excellence and delicacy of flavour, and beats it altogether out of the field when we take into consideration its sustaining and restorative powers.

A tale is told of a man who asserted that tea was stronger than beer. “A pot of beer,” said he, “will seldom attract more than a couple of men about it, but a pot of tea will draw half-a-dozen or more old women.”

A potent drink, much in vogue with the roystering blades of former times, was that known as “huff-cap.” The name was a cant expression for strong ale, which was so called because it induced people to set their caps in a bold huffing fashion. The term huff-cap was also used to denote a swaggering fellow, as may be gathered from Clifford’s _Note on Dryden_ (1687):—“Prethee tell me true, was not this huff-cap once the Indian Emperour, and at another time did he not call himself Maximine?” _Fulwel’s Art of Flattery_ thus mentions this variety of the juice of barley:—“To quench the scorching heat of our parched throtes, with the best nippitatum in this toun, which is commonly called _huff-cap_, it will make a man look as though he had seen the devil and quickly move him to call his own father a ———” (naughty name). Harrison, writing on the food and diet of the English in 1587, also {157} mentions huff-cap, and speaks of the mightiness of the ale in which our ancestors indulged; ale, in fact, as an old Proverb has it, “that would make a cat speak.” “Howbeit,” he writes, “though they are so nice in the proportion of their bread, yet in lieu of the same their is such headie ale and beere in moste of them, as for the mightinesse thereof among suche as seeke it oute, is commonly called huffe cap, the mad dog, angel’s food, dragon’s milke, etc. And this is more to be noted, that when one of late fell by God’s prouvidence into a troubled conscience, after he had considered well of his reachlesse life, and dangerous estate; another thinking belike to change his colour and not his mind, carried him straightwaie to the strongest ale, as to the next physician. It is incredible to saie how our malte bugs lug at this liquor, even as pigs should lie in a rowe, lugging at their dame’s teats, till they lie still againe and be not able to wag. Neither did Romulus and Remus sucke their shee woolfe or sheepherd’s wife Lupa with such eger and sharpe devotion as these men hale at hufcap, till they be red as cockes, and little wiser than their combs.” A strong ale, called “Huff,” is still brewed at Winchester, and is kept for the use of the fellows (not the boys) of that ancient institution.

Some idea of the strength of the ale usually drunk in the country districts in Elizabeth’s reign, may be gathered from a passage in a letter from Leicester to Burleigh, written while the Queen was on one of her famous progresses through the country: “There is not one drop of good drink here for her. We were fain to send to London, and Kenilworth, and divers other places where ale was; her own bere was so strong as there was no man able to drink it.”

To quote again from old Harrison on the fondness of his contemporaries for strong ale, speaking of workmen and others attending bride-ales (_i.e._, marriage feasts) and such like festivities, he says: “If they happen to stumble upon a peece of venison and a cup of wine or verie strong beere or ale (which latter they commonlie provide against their appointed daies) they thinke their cheere so great, and themselves to have fared so well, as the Lord Maior of London, with whom, when their bellies be full, they will not stick to make comparison.”

In the year 1680, during the debate on the Act to restrain the excess and abuse used in Victualling Houses, one member said that he wished “there might be a reformation of Ale, which is now made so strong, that he offered to affirm it upon oath, that it is commonly sold for a Groat a quart. _It is as strong as wine, and will burn like Sack._” {158}

The Water Poet thus describes the different qualities of mild and stale beer as known to the topers of the seventeenth century: “The stronger _Beere_ is divided into two parts (viz.), mild and stale; the first may ease a man of a drought, but the latter is like water cast into a Smith’s forge, and breeds more heart-burnings, and as rust eates into Iron, so overstale Beere gnawes aulet holes in the entrales, or else my skill failes, and what I have written of it is to be held as a Jest.”

Nipitatum or nipitato was another slang name for very strong ale. It is mentioned in _The Knight of the Burning Pestle_:—

My father oft will tell me of a drink, In England found and _Nipitato_ called, Which driveth all the sorrow from your hearts.

Another epithet applied to ale, and denoting great strength, was “humming,” and a reason for the term is shown by the extract from a letter from John Howell to Lord Ciffe (seventeenth century), who, in speaking of metheglin, says “that it keeps a humming in the brain, which made one say that he loved not metheglin because he was used to speak too much of the house he came from, meaning the hive.” The humming in the head would be equally applicable to the effects of ale as of metheglin, though the hive would only apply to the latter. The same idea is sometimes expressed by the term _hum-cup_, as in the lines from the old Sussex sheep-shearing song, beginning:—

’Tis a barrel then of _hum-cup_, which we call the black ram.

Besides these strong ales and others too numerous to mention, there was, at the beginning of last century, a certain strong beer called Pharaoh, which gave its name to an ale-house at Barley, in Cambridgeshire. The reason of the name is not certainly known, although it was said in the county that it was so called because it _would not let the people go_. This drink is no longer made in England, but a strong beer of the same name is much appreciated in Belgium. The same liquor is mentioned in the _Praise of Yorkshire Ale_ (1685):

. . . Coffee, Twist, Old Pharaoh and old Hoc,
Juniper Brandy and Wine de Langue-Dock.

As there have been many strong and mighty ales since the days when—

King Hardicanute, ’midst Danes and Saxons stout, Carous’d on nut-brown ale and dined on growt, {159}

so there have been an abundance of small poor drinks, which have been from time to time known by various terms of contempt, the titles “whip-belly-vengeance” and “rotgut” being, perhaps, on the whole, the most expressive. Shakspere sums up the humdrum of retired matronly life in the well-known line, “To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.” Beer which had been kept so long that it had turned sour was at one time known as “broken beer,” much as we speak now of broken victuals. Ben Jonson, in his _Masque of Gypsies_, makes mention of an infant “very carefully carried at his mother’s back, rock’d in a cradle of Welsh cheese like a maggot, and there fed with _broken beer_, and blown wine of the best daily.”

In olden times small beer discharged that friendly office assigned by later and more fastidious days to soda-water, namely, the cooling of the parched throat after a too earnest devotion to the rites of _Bacchus_.

Welcome to my lips, great king of frolic, Stern foe to headache, devils blue, and cholic— No dandy soda-water bring to me, No Lady’s lemonade, no soft bohea; Thy sterner aid I claim, and ask thy might To quell the riots of that punch last night;

wrote one of the Brasenose College poets. Christopher Sly, awakening from his debauch, cries aloud for “a pot of small ale . . . and once again a pot of the smallest ale,” and Prince Hal “remembers the poor creature small beer.”

A nameless author, writing in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, 1746, describes this function of small beer, and in poetic vein tells how after a “wine,” awaking from a feverish sleep, he sees before him a venerable man,

Old, but not bending with the weight of years;
His face was ruddy, and he smiled benign,
As if nor sickness had his form impair’d,
Nor anxious cares his soul: his silver’d head
Was bound with wreaths of salutary flow’rs,
Call’d _Hops_ by men, but _Panace_ by Gods.
“My son,” he said (and at his voice divine
New life beat vig’rous in each throbbing vein)
“Long has my friendly influence mov’d the scorn,
My name the laughter of the sons of men,
The sons of men, regardless of their weal {160}
And health, the greatest sublunary good!
The genius I of liquor, call’d below
Small Beer, and doubtless you have heard me damn’d
Full oft, by Belials rude, outrageous sons;
But yet, were honour due, to Temp’rance given,
Mine were the favours of th’ applauding crowd,
* * * * *
——Here, taste and live, live soberly and well.”
This said, a vase with steady hand he gave,
Full to the brim, I quaft’d the tender’d draught;
Swift the cool stream refresh’d my burning throat,—
* * * * *
In haste my visionary guest retir’d,
And left me deep in contemplation drown’d
Resolving reason never more to quench
In floods _Lethean_ of deceitful wine;
Deceitful wine! embrew’d with mixtures dire,
By the curs’d vintner’s art for sordid pelf.
O! grant me, Heav’n, to live with health and ease,
My books, a sober friend, _Small Beer_, and sense:
So shall my years the smiling fates prolong,
And each auspicious morn shall see me happy.

Even in distant times particular localities became noted for the excellence of their brewers. London early attained, and has maintained until the present day, a great reputation for its ale. Chaucer alludes to the taste of the Cook for a “draught of London ale.” Tyrwhitt says that in 1504 London ale was of such excellence that it fetched 5s. a barrel more than Kentish ale. This can hardly be, as we have already seen that at that period the barrel of London double ale only fetched 4s. Probably Tyrwhitt intended to refer to a tun and not to a barrel. The occasion referred to was the enthronement of William Wareham as Archbishop of Canterbury, when the provision made for washing down the vast stores of eatables was something tremendous. Besides great quantities of wine of many sorts, there were four tuns of London ale, six of Kentish, and twenty of English beer.

The malt liquors of London, and especially London porter and stout, are known from pole to pole, and Burton ales have a no less world-wide reputation. Indeed, the word Burton has in itself come to be synonymous with ale, and the expression “a glass of Burton” has become a household word. {161}

Burton and its famous brew are treated of elsewhere in these pages, and it must suffice here to insert an old song in praise of this nineteenth century nectar:—

BURTON ALE.

Ne’er tell me of liquors from Spain or from France, They may get in your heels and inspire you to dance, But the Ale of Old Burton if mellow and right Will get in your head and inspire you to fight.

Your Claret and Rhenish and fine Calcavella Were never yet able to make a good fellow, But of stout Burton Ale, if you drink but enough, ’Twill make you all jolly and hearty and tough.

Then let meagre Frenchmen still batten on Wine, They ne’er will digest a good English Sirloin, Parbleu they may caper and Vapour along, But right Burton can make us both valiant and strong.

Come here then ye Mortals who’re prone to despair From frowns of Dame Fortune or frowns of the fair, Whate’er your disorder, three nips will prevail, And the best Panacea you’ll find, Burton Ale.

Then Molly approach with your Peacock and Cann— Not Juno herself brought more blessings to Man— With nip after nip, all my sorrows beguile, And my Fortune and Mistress shall presently smile.

Old strong beer is sometimes known by the name of Stingo, and this appellation seems, for a couple of hundred years at least, to have been specially applied to Yorkshire Ale. The estimation in which this liquor was held at the end of the eighteenth century, and the wonders it was deemed capable of bringing about, may be learned from a perusal of _The Praise of Yorkshire Ale_, an old poem, extracts from which may be found in the chapter devoted to Ballads. We have been given to understand that the brewers of Yorkshire Stingo have not forgotten their ancient skill.

Our old friend Taylor mentions a goodly number of places where especially good ale was brewed in his day. “I should be voluminous,” he says, “if I should insist upon all pertinent and impertinent passages {162} in the Behalfe of _Ale_, as also of the retentive fame that _Yorke_, _Chester_, _Hull_, _Nottingham_, _Darby_, _Gravesende_, with a Toaste, and other Countries still enjoy, by making this untainted liquor in the primitive way, and how _Windsor_ doth more glory in that composition than all the rest of her speculative pleasures. . . . . Also there is a Towne neere _Margate in Kent_ (in the Isle of Thanet) called _Northdowne_, which Towne hath ingrost much Fame, Wealth, and Reputation from the prevalent potencie of their attractive _Ale_.”

Derby had as early as the sixteenth century a great reputation for its ales. Sir Lionel Rash, in _Green’s Tu Quoque_, an Elizabethan comedy, says: “I have sent my daughter this morning as far as Pimlico to fetch a draught of Derby Ale, that it may fetch a colour into her cheeks.” Fuller, in his _Worthies of England_, with an evident conservative taste for ale, that “authenticall drinke of old England,” mentions the repute of Derby ale with some circumlocution, but with no stinted praise. “Ceres being our English Bacchus,” he remarks, “this was our ancestors’ common drink, many imputing the strength of their Infantry (in drawing so stiff a bow) to their constant (but moderate) drinking thereof. Yea, now the English begin to turn to Ale (may they in due time regain their former vigorousnesse) and whereas in our remembrance, Ale went out when swallows came in, seldom appearing after Easter; it now hopeth (having climbed up May Hill) to continue its course all the year. Yet have we lost the Preservative, what ever it was, which (before Hops were found out) made it last so long in our land some two hundred years since, for half a year at least after the brewing thereof; otherwise of necessity they must brew every day, yea pour it out of the Kive into the Cup, if the prodigious English Hospitality in former ages be considered, with the multitude of menial servants and strangers entertained. Now never was the wine of Sarepta better known to the Syrians, that of Chios to the Grecians, of Phalernum to the Latines, than the Canary of Derby is to the English thereabout.”

Manchester at about the same period seems to have had a great assortment of Ales and Beers, if we are to believe Taylor, who, in his _Pennyless Pilgrimage_, tells

How men of Manchester did use me well,
* * * * *
We went into the house of one John Pinners
(A man that lives among a crew of sinners)
And there eight severall sorts of Ale we had,
All able to make one starke drunke or mad. {163}
But I with courage bravely flinched not,
And gave the Towne leave to discharge the shot,
We had at one time set upon the table,
Good Ale of Hisope, ’twas not Esope fable:
Then had we Ale of Sage, and Ale of Malt,
And Ale of Woorme-wood, that could make one halt,
With Ale of Rosemary, and Bettony,
And two Ales more, or else I needs must lye.
But to conclude this drinking Alye tale,
We had a sort of Ale called scurvy Ale.

The southern district of Devon, which is locally known as South Hams, has long been famed for a curious liquor known as “white ale.” The beverage is of great antiquity, and has been subject to tithe from time immemorial. Kingsbridge is supposed to have been the place where white ale was first brewed. It used to be made of malt, a small quantity of hops, flour, spices, and a mysterious compound known as “grout,” or “ripening,” the manufacture of which was, and may be still, preserved as a great secret in a few families. In another receipt for making this ale it is stated that a number of eggs should be added to the liquor before it is allowed to ferment, and this seems to have been an essential of the original brew, or at any rate was so considered in 1741. A writer at that date says:—“The Ale-wives, whose province of making this Ale it commonly falls under to manage from the beginning to the end, are most of them as curious in their brewing it, as the Dairy women in making their butter, for as it is a White Ale it soon sullies by dirt . . . . ; the wort is brewed by the hostess, but the fermentation is brought on by the purchase of what they call ‘ripening,’ or a composition, as some say, of flower of malt and white of eggs . .”

This luscious liquid has been described as “not the sparkling beverage brewed from malt and hops, but a milky-looking compound, of which, judging from the flavour, milk, spice and gin seemed to be among the ingredients. It does not improve by keeping, and is brewed only in small quantities for immediate consumption. It is kept in large bottles, and you will scarcely pass a public-house from Darmouth to Plymouth without seeing evidence of its consumption by the empty bottles piled away outside the premises.”

At the present time a considerable quantity of white ale is made in and about Tavistock. It is now, however, brewed in a simpler manner than of yore, and consists simply of common ale with eggs and flour {164} added. The labourers of that part of the country much affect it, and as it is highly nutritious it is regarded by many of them as “meat, drink and cloth” combined. A bloated habit of body is said to arise from a too faithful adherence to this luscious fluid. A former great connoisseur of this West-country ale, one Bone Phillips, lies buried just outside the church door at Kingsbridge; the following lines were inscribed over his grave at his request:—

Here lie I at the church door, Here be I because I’m poor, The further in the more you pay, Here lie I as warm as they.

While on the subject of epitaphs, the following may be quoted as having some bearing on the subject specially treated of in this chapter:—

Poor John Scott lies buried here; Tho’ once he was both _hale_ and _stout_, Death stretched him on his bitter bier: In another world he _hops_ about.

An ale of a similar nature to white ale goes in Cornwall by the rather uneuphonious title of “Laboragol.” Somewhat similar to the foregoing was grout[47] ale, which is said by Halliwell, on the authority of Dean Milles’ MS. glossary, to have been different from white ale, of a brownish colour, and known only to the people about Newton Bussel, who kept the method of preparing it a secret. A physician, a native of that place, informed him that the preparation was made of “malt almost burnt in an iron pot, mixed with some of the barm which rises on the first working in the keeve, a small quantity of which invigorates the whole mass and makes it very heady.” {165}

[47] The word grout properly signifies ground meal or malt. Kennett
says that in Leicestershire the infusion of malt and water before
it is fully boiled is called grout, and after it is tunned up it
is called wort. Ray explains it as wort of the last running. Pegge
says it is only drank by poor people, who are on that account called
“grouters.” See Halliwell’s Dict. of Arch. and Prov. Words. In the
old play, _Tom Tyler and his Wife_, growt is used to signify a kind
of ale.

This jolly growt is jolly and stout
I pray you stout it still-a,

While mentioning some few of the places specially noted for their ales, our ancient seats of learning must not be forgotten. Who has not heard of Trinity audit, and of that scarcely less famous liquor, Brasenose Ale? Many who have tasted the former have had no words to express their feelings; some have said that it is as superior to all other mortal brews as Chateau Lafitte is to vin ordinaire. These may seem words of extravagant praise; but let the reader who has never tasted this famous drink reserve his judgment on the point until he has, and above all let him lose no time in putting his judgment to the test. Trinity audit would justify the eulogy of the host in the _Beaux’ Stratagem_—“As smooth as oil, sweet as milk, clear as amber, strong as brandy; fancy it Burgundy, only fancy it, and it is worth ten shillings a quart.”

Oh, in truth, it gladdens the heart to see What may spring from the Ale of Trinitie,— A scholar—a fellow,—a rector blithe, (Fit to take any amount of tithe)— Perhaps a bishop—perhaps, by grace, One may mount to the Archiepiscopal place, And wield the crosier, an awful thing, The envy of all, and—the parsons’ King! O Jove! who would struggle with learning pale, That could beat down the world by the strength of Ale! For _me_,—I avow, could my thoughtless prime Come back with the wisdom of mournful time, I’d labour—I’d toil—by night and day, (Mixing liquors and books away,) Till I conquer’d that high and proud degree, M. A. (Master of Ale) of Trinitie.[48]

[48] A Panegyric on Ale addressed to W. L. Birkbeck, Esq., by Barry
Cornwall.

Brasenose College, Oxford, has long been noted for its ale. As each Shrovetide comes round, the college butler, as a condition of the tenure of his office, presents a barrel of the strongest nappy, and celebrates the event in verse, handing on to generations yet unborn the name and fame of the Brasenose brew. The earlier of these ale poems, which are in reality the effusions of some poetical undergraduate, had a fleeting existence, but some years ago Mr. Prior, who was then and still continues, {166} the butler of the College, published a collection of them in a small volume, entitled _Brasenose Ale_. In his little book, which we commend to the perusal of all good ale-knights, occur the following lines, written by R. J. B., in 1835:—

Lo! Prior hastens with his motley crew,
To pour the foaming liquor to our view:
Clasps his firm hand in all a Butler’s pride
The cup no Brasenose Fellow e’er denied:
Yet secret triumph o’er his brow has cast
That Ale the sweetest, as that brew the last!
“Away, ye lighter drinks! ye swipes, away,
Where masters bully, and where boys obey,”
The brewer cried; and taught the Ale to live
With all the charms that malt and hops could give.
Warm’d at his touch, behold the vapours rise
In all their genuine fragrance to the skies:
No beer-shops bev’rage, such as Cockneys buy,
Foul to the taste, and loathsome to the eye;
No dingy mixture, vulgarly call’d swipes;
No quassia juice, promoter of the gripes;
But true proportions of good hops and malt,
Mingled with care, then stow’d within the vault:
The hue that tells its potency—the scent
That breathes as if from blest Arabia sent.
Still o’er his Ale fond Prior hangs confest,
And joy and triumph swell his manly breast.
* * * * *
Such, glorious liquor of the olden time,
When to be drunk with Ale was deem’d no crime;
When in the morn and eve and mid-day stood
Upon our fathers’ boards old English food;
Such hast thou been, ’mid war and change the same,
Link’d with the poet’s and the scholar’s name,
Mellow’d by age—but still with flavour higher,
The pride of Brasenose, and the boast of Prior.

How Brasenose College came by its peculiar name is a much disputed point. There is a legend that in the far-off time of long ago certain students of the temporary university at Stamford, the iron ring of whose door-knocker was fitted in a nose of brass, migrated to Oxford, {167} and there set up a brazen nose over the entrance of their college as a souvenir of their former abode. Equally plausible is the tradition that upon the site of the college brewery once stood King Alfred’s brasinium (brewhouse), and that the name, clinging to the place through all the changes and chances of a thousand years, now appears under the slightly modified form of Brasenose. If the latter theory be correct, the Shrovetide feast and the yearly ode in praise of Brasenose Ale may be attributed to the desire to keep green the memory of the famous brewhouse of the good King, and the mighty liquor therein brewed for the royal table.

The merits of a celebrated Oxford butler, John Dawson of Christ Church, are commemorated in the following elegy:—

Dawson, the butler’s dead. Although I think Poets were ne’er infus’d with single drink I’ll spend a farthing, Muse; a wat’ry verse Will serve the turn to cast upon his hearse. If any cannot weep amongst us here, Take off his cap, and so squeeze out a tear: Weep, O ye Barrels! make waste more prodigal Than when our Beer was good, that John may float To Styx in beer, and lift up Charon’s boat With wholsome waves; and as the conduits ran, With claret at the Coronation, So let your channels flow with single tiff, For John, I hope is crown’d: take off your whiff, Ye men of rosemary, and drink up all, Rememb’ring ’tis a Butler’s funeral; Had he been master of good double Beer My Life for his, John Dawson had been here.

For a hundred years or more the town of Nottingham has been famous for its ales, and the song “Nottingham Ale” commemorates the many virtues of this justly celebrated “barley-wine.” Amongst others, it has virtues ecclesiastical:—

Ye bishops and deacons, priests, curates and vicars, Come taste, and you’ll certainly find it is true, That Nottingham Ale is the best of all liquors, And who understand the good creature like you? It dispels every vapour, saves pen, ink, and paper; For when you’re disposed in the pulpit to rail {168} It will open your throats, you may preach without notes, When inspired with full bumpers of Nottingham Ale.

This song, which was a great favourite at the end of last century, was composed by one Gunthorpe, a naval officer, by way of payment for a cask of the “particular,” received as a present from his brother, who was a Nottingham Brewer.

To go further north, Newcastle, besides its coals, has long had the reputation for what, if we are to believe the townsmen of the place, is the best, the stoutest, the brightest “Stingo” that the heart of man can desire. As every Jack will have his Jill, so famous ale ever finds its appropriate verses. The song _Newcastle Beer_, of which a verse is, given below, extols the wonders wrought by English beer in general, and by that of Newcastle in particular:—

’Twas Stingo like this made Alcides so bold,
It brac’d up his nerves, and enliven’d his powers;
And his mystical club, that did wonders of old,
Was nothing, my lads, but such liquor as ours.
The horrible crew
That Hercules slew,
Were Poverty—Calumny—Trouble—and Fear;
Such a club would you borrow,
To drive away sorrow,
Apply for a jorum of Newcastle Beer.

_Warrington Ale_, a song of last century, describes in glowing terms the good ale of that Lancashire town, and the poet, if he is to be believed, is evidently a man of some experience in various drinks:—

D’ye mind me, I once was a Sailor, And in different countries I’ve been; If I lie, may I go for a tailor, But a thousand fine sights I have seen. I’ve been crammed with good things like a wallet, And I’ve guzzled more drink than a whale; But the very best stuff to my palate Is a glass of your Warrington Ale.

De Foe in his _Tour through Great Britain_ eulogises the Lancashire ale of the period. In travelling through the northern parts of the county, “though it was but about the middle of August, and in some places the harvest hardly got in, we saw the mountains covered with {169} snow, and felt the cold very acute and piercing, but we found, as in all these northern countries, the people had a happy way of mixing the warm and the cold together; for the store of good ale which flows plentifully in the most mountainous parts of this country, seems abundantly to make up for all the inclemencies of the season, or difficulties of travelling.”

A certain very strong ale called Morocco is, or was, made at Levens Hall, in the County of Cumberland. Beef, or other meat, is an ingredient of this mighty brew, but the exact receipt is kept a secret. There is a tradition that the method of brewing Morocco was brought by a Crusader named Howard from certain unknown regions beyond the seas, and it is said that the receipt was buried during the Parliamentary wars, and was only unearthed many years afterwards. It is always brought in an immense and curiously wrought glass to everyone who dines at Levens for the first time, and the visitor is expected on no account to refuse the glass, but to take it and say, “To the health of the Lady of Levens.”

To go a little further north, the ales of Edinburgh are justly celebrated, old Scotch ale being as favourite a beverage as old Burton. Scotch brewers are great believers in malt and hops, and at the present day brew excellent light ales, as well as the mightier brew which has given them their world-wide reputation.

A curious ale is mentioned in the _Buik of Chroniclis of Scotland_ (fifteenth century). Owing to a very severe winter in the reign of William the Lion, liquids of many kinds were frozen solid, and ale was sold by _weight_:—

So furious ouir all part wes that frost Of bestiall that thair wes mony lost; The starkest aill of malt that mycht be browin, Thocht it war keipit neuir so clois and lowin, It wald congeill _and freis into hard yis_. The thing of all men thocht wes then most nys That this be weycht, and nocht mesour, wes sauld That tyme for drink as that my author told.

The wanderings of the _Penniless Pilgrim_ took him to Scotland, and he wonders much at the powers of ale-suction shown by the natives. “The Scots,” he says, “doe allow almost as large measure of their miles as they doe of their drinke, for an English gallon either of ale or wine is but their quart.” After rising from a repast, he tells how “the {170} servants of the house have enforced me into the seller or Buttery, where (in the way of kindnesse) they will make a man’s belly like a sowse-tub, and inforce mee to drinke as if they had a commission under the devil’s great seale, to murder men with drinking, with such a deal of complimentary oratory as, ‘off with your lap,’ ‘wind up your bottome,’ ‘up with your toplash,’ and many other eloquent phrases, which Tully and Demosthenes never heard of; that in conclusion I am persuaded three days fasting would have been more healthfull to mee, then two hours feeding and swilling in that manner.”

Christopher North, in his _Noctes Ambrosianæ_, mentions some of the famous Scotch ales of his day. After alluding to the ales of Berwick and of Giles, he says:—

“Maitland and Davison—again—has inspired my being with a _new_ feeling, for which no language I am acquainted with can supply an adequate name. That feeling impels me to say these simple words on behalf of the Spirit of Ale in general—speaking through me, its organ—_Ale loquitur_—“If not suffered by Fate to fix my abode in barrels of Berwick or Giles, where I have long reigned alternate years, in all my glory, scarcely should I feel myself priviledged to blame my stars, were I ordered for a while to sojourn in one of Maitland—and Davison.”

A notice of Scoth ales, however short, would be incomplete without some reference to the great Scotch national poet, who sometimes, at any rate, would seem to have owed his inspiration to the “barley bree.” The song of Burns, _O, Willie brew’d a peck o’ maut_, is too well known to need repetition here. Who does not remember the chorus of this admirable chanson-à-boire:—

We are na fou, we’re no that fou,
But just a drappie in our e’e,
The cock may craw, the day may daw,
And aye we’ll taste the barley bree!

The occasion which the song was intended to celebrate is not so commonly known. The “three merry boys,” Willie, Rob, and Alan were respectively William Nicol, of the High School, Edinburgh, our poet, and Alan Masterton, who was a schoolmaster and musical amateur. The place of meeting was a small farm named Laggan, belonging to Nicol. The inspiring ale was Nicol’s, the song was Burns’, and the music was Alan Masterton’s. “We had such a joyous meeting,” says Burns, “that Mr. Masterton and I agreed, each in our own way, to celebrate the business.” {171}

To pass to the Principality, Welsh ales were in Saxon times well known and highly esteemed. In the laws of Hywel Dda two kinds of ale are mentioned—Bragawd[49], which was paid as tribute to the King by a free township, and Cwrwf, which was more common, and was paid by the servile township in cases where the former kind ran short. It may be hence gathered that in early times the highly-flavoured Bragawd was held in greater estimation than the Cwrwf; yet the latter has out-lived the former, and is still to be had in various parts of Wales, where it is consumed with great gusto by Cambria’s patriotic sons.

[49] Bragawd or Bragot. See p. 379.

The neighbouring county of Hereford, now a great cider-drinking locality, had in former times at least one town with a reputation for good ale. “Lemster bread and Weobley ale” had passed into a proverb before the seventeenth century. The saying seems, however, to have been affected chiefly by the inhabitants of the county, who, perhaps, were not quite impartial. Ray, writing in 1737, ventures to question the pre-eminence ascribed to the places mentioned. For wheat he gives Hesten, in Middlesex, “and for ale Derby town, and Northdown in the Isle of Thanet, Hull in Yorkshire, and Sandbich in Cheshire, will scarcely give place to Weobley.” Herrick mentions this celebrated Northdown ale in the lines:—

That while the wassaile bowle here With North-down ale doth troule here, No sillable doth fall here, To marre the mirth at all here.

Norfolk was once celebrated for a strong ale, bearing the euphonious name of _Norfolk Nog_. It is mentioned in Vanbrugh’s _Journey to London_, “Here, John Moody,” says Sir Francis, “get us a tankard of good hearty stuff presently.” “Sir,” is the reply, “here’s Norfolk Nog to be had next door.” Swift also knew something of this brew, and mentions that “Walpole laid a quart of nog on it.” “Clamber-skull” is probably a variety of this strong Norfolk ale, and earned its name from the rapidity with which it mounted to the heads of its votaries. Norfolk still holds a high place as an ale-producing county, and the ales of Great Yarmouth and Norwich are justly celebrated.

Banbury produced a mighty ale in the seventeenth century, if we may judge from the couplet in _Wit Restored_:—

Banbury ale a half-yard pot The devil a tinker dares stand to ’t. {172}

It must have been strong indeed, for according to the old proverb—

Cobblers and tinkers Are your true ale drinkers.

Dorsetshire, amongst the southern counties, has long been noted for a fine pale ale. This is the liquor mentioned in _English Ale_ (1737) as—

Bright amber priz’d by the luxurious town, The pale hu’d Dorchester——

Its strength may be judged from the entry in John Byrom’s diary of about the same period (1725):—“I found the effect of last night’s drinking that foolish Dorset, which was pleasant enough, but it did not agree with me at all, for it made me very stupid all day.” These are the words of a man who has evidently loved not wisely but too well.

Cox, in his _History of Dorsetshire_ (1700), states that “since by the French wars the coming of French wine is prohibited, the people here have learned to brew the finest malt liquors in the kingdom, so delicately clean and well tasted that the best judges . . . . prefer it to the ales most in vogue, as Hull, Derby, Burton, &c.” Great quantities of Dorchester beer were consumed in London during the seventeenth and the early part of the eighteenth centuries, but from that time the trade with London, for some reason—probably the expense of transit—gradually fell away. The excellence of the Dorset beer depended in a great measure upon the fact that the water of the neighbourhood possessed peculiarly good qualities for brewing purposes, and, that advantage being of a permanent character, there seems to be no reason why the Dorchester ales of the present day should not regain throughout the country the position they had at the beginning of last century. In the south and south-western portions of England they are held in very high esteem.

Barnstaple was famous for its ales in the middle of the last century; a writer in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ of Jan., 1753, says that they are as good as Derby ales, though not quite so famous.

Mum, a popular drink early in the last century, was a strong ale brewed chiefly from wheat-malt with the addition of various aromatic herbs. Mum-houses were in existence in 1664, for Mr. Samuel Pepys records that on a certain occasion he went “with Mr. Norbury near hand to the Fleece, a mum-house in Leadenhall, and there drank _mum_, and by-and-by broke up.” A receipt of the date 1682, describes the brewing of mum as follows:— {173}