A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume II (of 2)

From these it appears that the real inventor was William Lee, whose name in the petition is written Lea, a native of Woodborough, in Nottinghamshire, a village about seven miles distant from the town of Nottingham. He was heir to a considerable freehold estate, and a graduate of St. John’s College, Cambridge. It is reported, that being enamoured of a young country-girl, who during his visits paid more attention to her work, which was knitting, than to her lover and his proposals, he endeavoured to find out a machine which might facilitate and forward the operation of knitting, and by these means afford more leisure to the object of his affection to converse with him. Love indeed is fertile in inventions, and gave rise, it is said, to the art of painting; but a machine so complex in its parts and so wonderful in its effects, would seem to require longer and quieter reflection, more judgement, and more time and patience, than can be expected in a lover. But even if the cause should appear problematical, there can be no doubt in regard to the inventor, whom most of the English writers positively assert to have been William Lee.

Aaron Hill seems to make the stocking-loom younger, and relates the circumstance in the following manner. A student of Oxford was so imprudent as to marry at an early period, without money and without income. His young wife, however, was able to procure the necessaries of life by knitting; but as the natural consequences of love, an increase of family, was likely to render this soon insufficient, the husband invented a machine by which knitting could be performed in a speedier and more profitable manner. Having thus completed a stocking-loom, he became by its means a man of considerable wealth[911 - This account is given by Aaron Hill in his Rise and Progress of the Beech-oil Invention, 1715, 8vo.]. But Hill, in his account, gives neither names, date, nor proofs; and as he seems to have formed it from an imperfect remembrance of what he had heard or read in regard to Lee, it is not worthy of further examination.

Deering says expressly, that Lee made the first loom in the year 1589; and this account has been adopted by Anderson and most of the English writers. In the stocking-weavers’ hall, at London, is an old painting, in which Lee is represented pointing out his loom to a female knitter, who is standing near him; and below it is seen an inscription with the date 1589, which was the year of the invention[912 - The inscription may be found in Seymour’s Survey of London, 1733, fol. vol. i. p. 603: “In the year 1589 the ingenious William Lee, Master of Arts of St. John’s College, Cambridge, devised this profitable art for stockings (but being despised went to France) yet of iron to himself, but to us and others of gold; in memory of whom this is here painted.”]. Other accounts make it somewhat later. Thus Howell, after relating that Queen Elizabeth obtained the first stockings in 1561, says that thirty-nine years after the loom was invented by Lee, in which case the period would be 1600[913 - In his History of the World, already quoted, p. 171: “Nine and thirty years after was invented the weaving of silk stockings, westcoats, and divers other things, by engines, or steel looms, by William Lee, Master of Arts of St. John’s College in Cambridge, a native of Nottingham, who taught the art in England and France, as his servants in Spain, Venice, and Ireland; and his device so well took, that now in London his artificers are become a company, having an hall and a master, like as other societies.”]. In the petition of the stocking-knitters it is stated, that the loom, at that time, had been found out about fifty years. It is to be regretted that this document has no date; but as Cromwell reigned from 1653 to 1658, the invention would fall in the beginning of the seventeenth century. It is more probable, however, that it belongs to the end of the sixteenth.

Lee instructed his brother James in the use of the loom, and took apprentices and assistants, with whom he carried on business for some years at Calverton, a village five miles distant from Nottingham. On this account, Calverton has by some been considered as his birth-place. He showed his work to Queen Elizabeth, who died in 1603, and requested from that princess some support or remuneration; but he obtained neither, and was impeded rather than assisted in his undertaking. Under these circumstances, Lee accepted an invitation from Henry IV. king of France, who had heard of this invention, and promised to give a handsome reward to the author of it. He therefore carried nine journeymen and several looms to Rouen in Normandy, where he worked with great approbation; but the king being assassinated, and internal commotions having taken place, Lee fell into great distress, and died soon after at Paris. Two only of his people remained in France, one of whom was still alive when the before-mentioned petition was presented to Cromwell. Seven of them returned to England; and these, with a person named Aston, who at first was a miller at Thoroton, the place of his birth[914 - Of this Aston the following account is to be found in Thoroton’s Nottinghamshire, 1677, fol. p. 297: “At Calverton was born William Lee, Master of Arts in Cambridge, and heir to a pretty freehold here; who seeing a woman knit, invented a loom to knit, in which he or his brother James performed and exercised before Queen Elizabeth, and leaving it to … Aston his apprentice, went beyond the seas, and was thereby esteemed the author of that ingenious engine, wherewith they now weave silk and other stockings. This … Aston added something to his master’s invention; he was some time a miller at Thoroton, nigh which place he was born.”], but afterwards an apprentice of Lee, by whom he had been left behind in England, where he made some improvements in the loom, laid the foundation of the stocking-manufactory in that country. The number of masters increased there in the course of fifty years so much, that it was found necessary to unite them into one guild; for which Cromwell, however, in consequence of reasons not known, refused the proper sanction; but in 1663 they received letters patent, which gave them certain privileges to the extent of ten miles round London.

In the year 1614, the Venetian ambassador, Antonio Correr, persuaded an apprentice, Henry Mead, by the promise of five hundred pounds sterling, to go with a loom to Venice for a stated time, and to teach there the use of it. Mead met with a favourable reception in that city, and was much admired; but the loom becoming deranged, and no person at Venice being able to repair it, when the time of his agreement was expired, he returned to England. The Venetians had not resolution enough to continue the attempt; and sent the damaged loom, together with some bad imitations of it, to London, where they were sold for a mere trifle. Such is the account given in the petition before-mentioned.

Zano, however, an Italian writer[915 - Dell’ Agricoltura, dell’ Arti, e del Commercio. Ven. 1763, 8vo.], asserts, on the authority of information preserved in manuscript among family documents, that Correr carried two stocking-weavers with looms to Venice; that he immediately placed under them four apprentices, and when they went back to England sent with them a boy, who returned to Venice well-instructed in the art, and who continued to carry on business there with great success. Giambattista Carli of Gemona, a smith who worked in steel, saw the loom at Venice, which had been made after the model of those brought from England and sold to Francesco Alpruni of Udina. In a short time a great many stockings were manufactured there, and sent for sale, chiefly to Gradisca in Austria. But, in consequence of the poverty of the Venetian stocking-knitters, an order was issued that Carli should make no more looms; and this productive branch of business at Udina was so much deranged, that the masters removed with their looms to Gradisca, where the inhabitants of Udina were obliged to purchase such stockings as they had occasion to use.

Some years after the stocking-loom had been introduced at Venice, Abraham Jones, who understood stocking-weaving and the construction of the loom, though never regularly taught, went with some assistants to Amsterdam, where he worked on his own account two or three years, till he and his people were carried off by a contagious disease. The looms, because no one could use them, were sent to London and sold for a low price. In the petition to Cromwell the masters state, with great satisfaction, that in this manner the trade had remained in England; and, that it may be exclusively retained in their native country, they wish for the establishment of a privileged company.

It appears to me therefore proved beyond all doubt, that the stocking-loom was invented by William Lee, an Englishman, about the end of the sixteenth century; and this is admitted by some French writers, such as Voltaire[916 - Le Siècle de Louis XIV.] and the editor of the first Encyclopédie, whom the author of the Encyclopédie Méthodique however finds fault with. Other French writers, who are the more numerous party, wish to ascribe the honour of this invention to one of their own countrymen; but the proofs they bring are so weak that they scarcely deserve notice. Savary perhaps is the first person who publicly ventured to support this instance of Gallic vanity; at any rate he is quoted by the more modern writers as their authority when they wish to contradict the English.

According to his account, a Frenchman, of whom however he knows nothing further, invented the stocking-loom; but not being able to obtain the exclusive privilege of using it in his own country, went with it to England. The utility of it being soon discovered there, it was forbidden, under pain of death, to carry a loom or a model of it out of the kingdom. But another Frenchman, respecting whom he is equally ignorant, having seen the loom, the form of it made so deep an impression on his memory, that on his return he copied it exactly; and from this loom all the others used in France and Holland were constructed. Savary adds, did the invention belong to the English, who are accustomed to pay due honour to those who discover useful things, they undoubtedly could tell the name of the inventor, which however they are not able to do. It is very strange that this should be written by a Frenchman, who himself did not know the name of the French inventor, or of the person who carried back the invention. No order to prevent the exportation of the stocking-loom was issued in England so early, else it would certainly have been mentioned in the petition presented to Cromwell. It was not till the eighth year of the reign of William III., that is 1696, when looms were everywhere common, that the exportation of them was forbidden; probably because the best were made in England, and it was wished that the gradual improvement of them should be kept secret. The penalty also was not death, but a fine and confiscation of the looms.

Some have endeavoured to give an air of probability to this assertion of Savary, by the relation of an apothecary in the Hotel-Dieu at Paris. This person is said to have declared that the inventor was a journeyman locksmith of Lower Normandy, who gave a pair of silk stockings, his own workmanship, to Colbert, in order that they might be presented to Louis XIV.; but as the marchands bonetiers, who dealt in articles knit according to the old manner, caused several loops of these stockings to be cut by some of the servants at court, whom they had bribed for that purpose, they did not meet with approbation. The inventor was so hurt by this disappointment, that he sold the loom to an Englishman, and died an old man in the Hotel-Dieu, where the apothecary became acquainted with him. It was necessary to expose the lives of many workmen, and even of some men of learning, in order to bring back a loom to France. Romè de la Platière adds, that he heard at Nimes, that in the time of Colbert a person of that place, named Cavellier, carried the first loom to France; and that, in the course of fifty years, the number of the looms in that town and neighbourhood increased to some thousands. It appears much more certain that the stocking manufactory, as Savary asserts, was established at the castle of Madrid in the Bois Boulogne near Paris, in the year 1656, under the direction of John Hindret.

I do not know at what time the first loom was brought to Germany; but it is certain that this branch of manufacture was spread chiefly by the French refugees who sought shelter in that country after the revocation of the edict of Nantes. Winkelmann says expressly, that they carried the first looms to Hesse. This is not at all improbable, because our stocking manufacturers give French names to every part of their looms, as well as to their different kinds of work. Becher boasts of having introduced the loom at Vienna, and of having first constructed looms of wood. At present many wooden ones are made at Obernhau in the Erzgebürge, and sold at the rate of twenty-eight dollars; whereas iron ones, of the most inferior kind, are sold in Vogtland for sixty or seventy.

[In 1663 a charter was granted by Charles II. to the Frame-work Knitters’ Society of London (stocking-makers), which had been refused to them a few years before by Oliver Cromwell. Six years afterwards the number of stocking-frames in England amounted to 700, employing 1200 workmen, three-fifths of whom made silk stockings, and the others worsted; for cotton was not then ranked among English manufactures. By 1714 the number of frames had increased to 8000 or 9000. Some years after this, the Frame-work Knitters’ Company attempted to control both the manufacture itself, and the making and selling of the stockings; but the project failed. By the year 1753 the number of frames in England was 14,000. In 1758 a machine for making ribbed stockings was patented by Mr. Strutt of Belper.

In 1838 stocking-frames with a rotatory action, and worked by steam, were successfully brought into use in Nottingham. Of the present extent and value of the hosiery manufacture, perhaps the best estimate is that made a few years ago by Mr. Felkin of Nottingham. This gentleman calculates the value of cotton hosiery annually made at £880,000, that of worsted at £870,000, and that of silk at £241,000. He estimates the number of stockings annually manufactured at 3,510,000 dozens; and in the production of these there are used 4,584,000 lbs. of raw cotton, value £153,000; 140,000 lbs. of raw silk, value £91,000; and 6,318,000 lbs. of English wool, value £316,000; making the total value of the materials £560,000, which are ultimately converted into the exchangeable value of £1,991,000. The total number of persons employed is 73,000.]

HOPS

My object, in this article, is not to give a history of beer, because for that purpose it would be necessary to define accurately the different kinds of grain mentioned in the writings of the Greeks and the Romans; and this would be a tedious, as well as difficult, and to me a very unpleasant labour; as I should be obliged to controvert a great many received opinions. I shall only endeavour to answer the question, Where and at what time did hops begin to be used as an addition to beer? This subject has already engaged the attention of two learned men[917 - One of these, in particular, is J. F. Tresenreuter, in A Dissertation on Hops, which was printed at Nuremberg, 1759, 4to, with a preface by J. Heumann.], whose researches I shall employ and enlarge by my own observations.

Hops at present are so well known, that a formal description of them would be superfluous. I think it necessary, however, for the sake of perspicuity, to state what follows. This plant at present grows wild in the greater part of Europe, and in Germany is common in the hedges and fences. It clings to the trunks of trees, and often climbs round poles, if long enough, to the height of twenty or thirty feet. It is almost everywhere rough and sharp to the touch, and sometimes clammy. The leaves are generally divided into three, and often into five indented lobes; but the upper ones are shaped like a heart and undivided. The male plants bear flowers, like those of the currant-bush or of the male hemp; the female plants produce their flowers in cones, which are not unlike those of the fir, except that the latter are woody, while the former are foliaceous. These cones only are used for beer; on that account the female plants alone are cultivated, and from these they are picked and dried as soon as they begin to become pulverulent. They are transplanted or propagated by means of seedlings, in hop-grounds properly prepared, where the cones become larger and better than those of the wild plants, which however are not entirely useless. They are added to beer to render it more palatable, by giving it an agreeable bitter taste; and, at the same time, to make it keep longer; and it must indeed be confessed, that of the numerous and various additions which since the earliest periods have been tried, none has better answered the purpose, or been more generally employed.

Among the botanists of the last two centuries, who perused the writings of the Greeks and the Romans, and endeavoured to discover those plants which they meant to describe, many imagined that they found in them hops. But when one takes the trouble to examine without prejudice their opinions, nothing appears but a very slight probability; and some even of these learned botanists, such as Matthioli and others, have acknowledged that it cannot be proved that the Greeks and the Romans were acquainted with our hops.

The plant which perhaps has been chiefly considered as the hop is the Smilax aspera[918 - Σμίλαξ τραχεῖα.] of Dioscorides[919 - Dioscor., iv. 244.], the same no doubt as that described by Theophrastus under the name of smilax, without any epithet[920 - Hist. Plant. iii. 18.]. That the description agrees for the most part with our hops cannot be denied; but it is equally true that it might be applied, with no less propriety, to many other creeping plants, and certainly with the greatest probability to that which in the Linnæan system has retained the name Smilax aspera. What the Grecian writer says of the fruit is particularly applicable to this plant; but, on the other hand, it differs from the fruit of the hop.

One might with more probability conjecture that hops occur in Pliny[921 - xxi. 15, sect. 50.], under the name Lupus salictarius. But the whole of what he says of this plant is, that it was esculent, and grew in the willow plantations. This is undoubtedly true of hops, for that the young shoots are eaten in spring as salad is well known; but the name lupus alone has induced the commentator to apply all this, though equally applicable to other plants, to our hop, which at present is called lupulus. Much more unfounded is the conjecture, that the hop is that wild plant which, according to the account of Cato, was used as fodder for cattle[922 - Cato De Re Rustica, xxxvii. p. 55.]. But the word in manuscripts is differently written, and consequently uncertain; besides, there are many plants which might be employed in the place of straw.

It is certainly possible that hops might have been in use among the northern nations, at the time of these writers, without their having any knowledge of them; for the Romans were acquainted with beer only from the accounts given of the Germans and their manners[923 - Most of the passages in ancient authors which relate to beer have been collected by Dithmar in his edition of Tacitus De Moribus German. cap. xxiii.; and by Meibom De Cerevisiis Veterum in Gronovii Thes. Antiq. Græc., ix. p. 548.], and they considered that beverage merely as an unsuccessful imitation of their wine. But I agree in opinion with Conring, Meibomius, and others, that hops were not used till a much later period. The names humulus and lupulus also are of no great antiquity. The former is the oldest, and seems to belong to the people who first added this improvement to beer. The humble and humle of the Swedes and Danes, the chumel of the Bohemians, the houblon of the French and the Spanish, Hungarian and Persian appellations, all seem to be derived from the same origin, as well as the Latin names of later times, humelo, humolo, humulo, humlo[924 - [The word humulus is derived from humus, fresh earth, the hop only growing in rich soils. – Loudon and Sir W. Hooker.]]. Lupulus does not occur till a much later period. The German word, which the English also have adopted, appears first to have been written hoppe, from which was formed afterwards in High German Hopfen, by converting, as it commonly does, the double p into the harder pf. Thus from toppe it has made topf, and from koppe, kopf, &c. As far as I know, this word is found, for the first time, in a dictionary which seems to be of the tenth century[925 - This valuable monument of antiquity is to be found in (Nyerup) Symbolæ ad Literaturam Teutonicam, sumtibus A. F. Suhm, Havniæ 1787, 4to, pp. 331, 404.], and which has Timalus, Hoppe and Brandigabo Feldhoppe. According to my conjecture, timalus has been erroneously printed for humulus; but in regard to brandigabo I can give no explanation. It is derived perhaps from brace or bracium. The former was known to Pliny[926 - Lib. xviii. cap. 7.]; and the latter occurs in the same dictionary along with the translation, malt.

No mention is made of hops either in Walafrid Strabo, who died in 849, or in Æmilius Macer, who cannot have lived earlier than the year 850; in the laws of the old Franks, in which beer and malt are often mentioned, or in the Capitulare de Villis Imperatoris, which are ascribed to Charles the Great. Had beer been then used and brewed in Germany, it would certainly have been at any rate mentioned by the emperor. Haller says[927 - Histor. Stirpium, ii. p. 290.] it is related by Isidorus that the experiment of adding hops to beer was first made in Italy. Were this the case, it would be the oldest mention of that circumstance, for Isidorus died in the year 636. It is however not only highly improbable that the use of hops should be discovered in Italy, which is a wine country, but it can be proved to be false. Not the smallest notice of it is to be found in the whole work of Isidorus; and in the Bibliotheca Botanica, when Haller had the book before him and extracted from it many things remarkable, he does not repeat this assertion[928 - Biblioth. Botan. i. p. 161.]. The passage which has given rise perhaps to this error, appears to be that where the author describes a kind of beer called by him celia, and where the germination of corn, the shooting of malt, and the sweet wort made from it, together with its fermentation, are clearly mentioned, but not hops[929 - Originum lib. xx. 3, p. 487.]. Some one perhaps thought that hops also ought to be supposed in this passage, else beer would not acquire that strong taste and intoxicating quality spoken of by Isidorus, who very properly ascribes both to fermentation. The same account has been repeated by Vincentius[930 - Speculum Naturale, lib. xi. 109.], without any change or addition. But as Isidorus scarcely contains anything which is not borrowed from earlier writers, I endeavoured to discover the source of that information, and at length found it in the history of Orosius[931 - Lib. v. cap. 7.], who, as is well known, lived in the fifth century.

In the Latin translation of the works of the Arabian physician Mesue[932 - Joh. Mesuæ Opera. Venetiis, 1589, fol.] is a description, but as is commonly the case, a defective one, of a creeping plant, with rough indented leaves under the name of lupulus, which indeed corresponds exceedingly well with our hops. The cones in particular are exactly described. The author, however, speaks there only of the medicinal qualities of the plant, and makes no mention of its application to beer. Mesue lived about the year 845, consequently is the first who uses the term lupuli. But we have only a wretched old translation of the writings of this physician; it is probable that the word lupulus comes only from the translator. This passage therefore can prove nothing.

It is however certain that hops were known in the time of the Carolingian dynasty, for a letter of donation by King Pepin speaks of humolariæ, which without doubt must have been hop-gardens[933 - Du Cange Doublet Hist. Sandionys. i. 3, p. 669.]. In like manner Adelard, abbot of Corbey, in the year 822, freed the millers belonging to his district from all labour relating to hops, and on this occasion employed the words humlo and brace, by which is to be understood corn and malt used for beer. In the Frisingen collection of ancient documents, there are many which were written in the time of Ludovicus Germanicus, consequently in the middle of the ninth century; and in some of these, hop-gardens, which were then called humularia, are mentioned[934 - In C. Meichelbeck’s Histor. Frising. I. Instrument. p. 359.]. In the tax registers of the two following centuries, among the articles delivered to churches and monasteries, modii and moldera humuli are very often named[935 - See the works quoted by Tresenreuter, p. 15: Pezii Thesaur. Anecdot. i. P. 3, pp. 68, 72. – J. C. Harenberg Histor. Gandersheim. p. 1350. – Eccard Origin. Saxon. p. 59. – Leukfeld Antiquit. Poeldens. p. 78.]. Hop-fields and the delivery of hops occur much oftener in the thirteenth century, under the appellations humuleta, humileta, and humularia[936 - F. G. de Sommersberg Silesiac. Rer. Scriptor. i. pp. 801, 829, 857. – Von Ludwig Reliq. Histor. v. p. 425. – Tresenreuter, p. 20, quotes later information in the fourteenth century.]. In the Sachsenspiegel[937 - L. ii. art. 52.] and the municipal law of Magdeburg (Weichbildsrechte[938 - Art. 126.]), there is an order in regard to the hop-plants which grew over hedges. I shall omit the still more numerous instances where they occur in the fourteenth century as well as the proofs that hops were then cultivated in many parts of Germany; and it is perhaps true, as said by Möhsen, and after him by Fischer, on whose bare word however I do not entirely rely, that many towns in Germany were indebted for the great sale of their beer to the use of hops (which undoubtedly appears to be a German discovery), and to their peculiar goodness. However, it is certain that this method of seasoning beer was adopted at a much later period by our neighbours the English, Dutch, Swedes, and others.

If the two passages above quoted, where the word lupuli occurs, be rejected because they are doubtful, I must consider this name of hops to be more modern than the word humulus; and if this be true, it is impossible to believe, with Du Cange, that the latter was formed from the first by throwing away the initial letter. As yet I had not found the name lupulus given to hops earlier than the thirteenth century.

About this time lived Simon of Genoa, commonly called Johannes de Janua or Januensis, who also had the surname of Cordus. He was physician to Pope Nicholas IV.; afterwards chaplain and sub-deacon to Pope Boniface VIII.; and therefore flourished at the end of the thirteenth century. Of his writings none is better known, or was formerly more esteemed, than his Catholicon, a book in which he describes, in alphabetical order, all the substances then used in medicine, and on which, as he says himself, he was employed thirty years. In this dictionary, which is commonly considered as the first of the Materia medica, there is an article under the head lupulus, copied however from the before-mentioned Latin translation of Mesue, but with the addition, that this plant by the French and Germans is named humilis, and that the flowers of it were used in a beverage which he calls medo[939 - For an account of the author and his works, which are now scarce, see Haller’s Bibliotheca Botan. i. p. 222.]. This Italian, however, does not seem to have been properly acquainted with the subject; for he tells us himself[940 - Article Ydromel.], that under the name medo or mead, is understood a beverage made of diluted honey, for which hops are never employed. In Italy also, at that time, hops were not in use. About the same period, Arnold de Villanova, in his commentary on the work on Regimen, published by John of Milan, in the name of the celebrated school of Salerno, mentions lupuli, and the use of them in brewing beer[941 - This celebrated work, known as the Schola Salernitatis, was first printed in 1649, and has since been frequently republished and translated into various languages. A very complete edition, with an English version and a history of the book, was given by the late Sir Herbert Croft. The history of this book may also be found in Giannone’s History of Naples.].

Professor Tychsen, to whose friendship I have been frequently indebted for assistance in my researches, suggested to me the conjecture that lupulus perhaps is derived from lupinus, because Columella says that the bitter seeds of this plant were added, in Egypt, to beer in order to moderate its sweetness[942 - [Loudon observes in his Encycl. Plants, that lupulus is a contraction of Lupus salictarius, the name by which it was, according to Pliny, formerly called, because it grew among the willows, to which, by twining round and choking up, it proved as destructive as the wolf to the flock.]]. This use is confirmed also by G. W. Lorsbach, from the Arabic historian Ebn Chalican[943 - Columella, x. 116. The root (radish?) was sliced and put into the Egyptian beer along with steeped lupines, in order to render it more palatable. Lorsbach über eine Stelle des Ebn Chalican. Marburg, 1789, 8vo, p. 21.]. At any rate, this proves that in Egypt at that time bitter things began to be added to beer. It is also well known that in Italy lupines were rendered fit for the use of man as well as of animals, by macerating them in water[944 - Plin. xviii. 14, sect. 36. – Geopon. ii. 39, p. 189, and the passages quoted there by Niclas: Galen. de Fac. Simpl. Med. vi. 144: and Alim. Fac. i. 30.]; and I am of opinion, that on this account Varro required water to be in the neighbourhood of a farm-yard[945 - De Re Rustica, i. 13, 3.]. Lupines softened in water are still employed for making dough. But if lupulus was formed from lupinus, it must however be proved that the use of it for beer was common beyond the boundaries of Egypt. Even if we admit with Schöttgen, that the poet employs zythum for beer in general, this beverage was never used in Italy, and I have met with no other mention of lupines in brewing.

In the breweries of the Netherlands, hops seem to have been first known in the beginning of the fourteenth century; for about this time we find many complaints that the new method of brewing with hops lessened the consumption of gruit, and also the income arising from gruitgeld. The word gruit seems to have many meanings: in the first place it signifies malt; but though I formerly considered this as the proper meaning, and though some approved my opinion, I must confess that on further examination I am not able fully to prove it. In the second place, it signified a certain tax paid at each time of brewing: thirdly, a certain addition of herbs used for beer in the fourteenth century: and in the last place, the beer brewed with it was itself sometimes called gruit.

That this word always denoted malt is impossible; for it is said that after hops were introduced, less gruit was used and sold than formerly had been the case. But how could hops be employed instead of malt? John, bishop of Liege and Utrecht, complained to the emperor Charles IV., that for thirty or forty years a new method of brewing, that is to say, with the addition of a certain plant called humulus or hoppa, had been introduced, and that his income arising from gruitgeld had been thereby much lessened. The emperor, therefore, in the year 1364, permitted him, for the purpose of making good his loss, to demand a groschen for each cask of hops; and this right was confirmed to bishop Arnold by pope Gregory[946 - This document is in Matthæi Analecta Vet. Ævi, iii. p. 260. See also Du Cange, under the word Grutt, and its derivatives.]. By this and similar accounts I am induced to conjecture that a beverage composed of different herbs was at that time prepared, and that the sale of this mixture and of gruit was converted into a so-called regale. Nay, it almost appears that gruit was a fermenting substance, indispensably necessary to beer, instead of the yeast used at present.

According to every appearance the ancient beer could not be long kept; and beer fit to be preserved seems to have come into use after the introduction of hops. The oldest writers who treat of the good and bad effects of hops, reckon among the latter, that they dried up the body and increased melancholy; but among their good qualities, they praise their property of preserving liquors from corruption[947 - St. Hildegard in Physicæ, lib. ii. cap. 74. Petro Crescentio d’Agricoltura, lib. vi. cap. 56. This writer lived in the thirteenth century.]. It was soon remarked also, that the keeping of beer depended a great deal on the season in which it was brewed; for M. Anton quotes from the Ilm statutes of 1350, that people were permitted to brew only from Michaelmas to St. Walpurgis’ day[948 - A celebrated female saint of the eighth century, said to have been a native of England, but canonised in Germany, where she was abbess of a nunnery at Heidensheim in Thuringia. – Trans.]; at other times it was forbidden under certain penalties. At that period various kinds of beer seem to have been in use, and perhaps became fashionable instead of wine, coffee, and tea. Thus M. Anton quotes, from a Hervord document of the year 1144, cervisia mellita and non mellita. However, even at present, honey is used for many kinds of beer; such for example as that brewed at Nimeguen, which has an extensive sale under the name of moll, a word derived no doubt from mollig, mild; which is applied also to wine. In the same manner the English used liquorice.

In England, the use of hops seems to have been introduced at a much later period; but it is said that they were at first considered as a dangerous production, and that the planting of them was forbidden in the reign of Henry VI., about the middle of the fifteenth century[949 - This is asserted in the Götting. Gel. Anzeigen, 1778, p. 323.]. This I will not venture to deny, though I very much doubt it. I have found no proof of it in any English writer, and I have searched in vain for the prohibition among the orders of that prince, in which however there occurs one in regard to malt[950 - Statutes at Large, vol. i. p. 591.]. On the contrary, many English historians assert that the use of hops was first made known in England by some people from Artois, in the reign of Henry VIII., or about the year 1524[951 - Husbandry and Trade Improved, by J. Houghton. Lond. 1727, 8vo. ii. p. 457. – Anderson’s Hist. of Commerce. [The fermented liquor anciently in use in this country is usually termed ale, but we have in fact no certain account of its composition, and all that is now known respecting it is, that it was a pleasant but intoxicating liquor. Our Saxon ancestors were so far addicted to its use, that so far back as the time of king Edgar, it was found necessary to order marks to be made in their cups at a certain height, beyond which they were forbidden to fill, under a severe penalty. This probably gave rise to the peg tankard, of which there are a few still remaining. It held two quarts, and had on the inside a row of eight pegs, one above the other, from top to bottom, so that the space between each contained half a pint. The law of compotation was, that every one who drank was to empty the exact space between peg and peg, and if he either exceeded or fell short of his measure, he was bound to drink down to the next. In archbishop Anselm’s canons, made in the council of London, A.D. 1102, we find an order, by which priests were enjoined not to go to drinking bouts, nor to drink to pegs.]]. It is nevertheless true, that this sovereign, in an order respecting the servants of his household, in the twenty-second year of his reign, that is in 1530, forbade brewers to put into ale hops and sulphur[952 - Archæologia, vol. iii. p. 157. [Indeed, at a much later period, the common council of the city of London petitioned parliament against the use of hops, “in regard that they would spoyl the taste of drinks and endanger the people.” – See Walter Blithe in his Improver Improved, published in 1649.]]. But perhaps his majesty was not fond of hopped beer. Even at present, most of the dictionaries call ale, beer brewed without hops; and an English physician says expressly that the difference between ale and beer is, that hops are not employed for the former[953 - Hamburgisches Magazin, xxxiii. p. 465.]. But according to the English instructions for brewing, hops are required for ale also.

In the English laws hops are mentioned for the first time in the fifth year of the reign of Edward VI., that is in 1552, at which period some privileges were granted to hop-grounds. The cultivation of hops however, which, like the art of brewing, has in England been carried to the greatest perfection, was very limited even in the beginning of the seventeenth century; for James I., in the fifth year of his reign, that is in 1603, found it necessary to forbid, under severe penalties, the introduction and use of spoilt and adulterated hops. At that time, therefore, England did not produce a quantity sufficient for its own consumption.

In Sweden, at least in the fifteenth century, hops seem not to have been very common[954 - Instead of this plant, which grows wild in Sweden, another wild plant in Germany called post, and by botanists Ledum palustre, was in old times used for beer by poor people in its stead; but it occasioned violent headaches. – See Linnæi Amœnitat. Acad. viii. p. 270. [This plant is still extensively used in the northern parts of Germany for imparting a bitter flavour to beer, although, owing to its deleterious nature, it is strictly forbidden by the laws. In this country Cocculus indicus is sometimes employed for a like purpose.]]; for at that time sweet gale (Myrica gale) was employed for beer; and so generally, that king Christopher, in 1440, confirmed the old law, that those who collected this plant before a certain period, on any common or on another person’s land, should be subjected to a fine. A similar punishment however was appointed for the too early picking of hops; and the cultivation of them was so strongly enforced, that every farmer who had not forty poles with hops growing round them was punished, unless he could show that his land was unfit for producing them[955 - This law is said to have been made as early as the reign of Magnus Smeek; but it was confirmed by king Christopher in 1440, and by the command of Charles IX. was printed at Stockholm, in folio, in 1608, in a work entitled Swerikes Rijkes Landz-lagh. The passage which belongs to this subject stands in Bygninga Balker, cap. 49 and 50, p. xl. a.].

But it was long doubted in Sweden whether this plant would thrive in the cold climate of that country; in which however it grows wild. In the time of Gustavus I., who became king in 1523, Sweden was obliged to give for the foreign hops it used 1200 schifpfunds of iron, which was about the ninth part of all the iron made in the kingdom. In the year 1558 the king complained, in an edict, that a pound of hops cost as much as a barrel of malt, and on that account was desirous to encourage the cultivation of the hop-plant. But his exertions were attended with so little effect, that even under the reign of queen Christina, that is, in the middle of the seventeenth century, all the hops used in the kingdom were imported from Germany, and particularly from Brunswick and Saxony. The queen had some hop plantations as rarities in her garden; yet the cultivation of hops was begun under this princess, and carried so far that German hop farmers, who before had been accustomed to travel to Sweden every three years, to receive payment and take new orders, returned very much dissatisfied, and suffered a part of their hop-grounds to run to waste. Under Charles XI., however, who reigned from 1660 to 1697, the cultivation of hops was first brought to a state of considerable improvement.

In the year 1766, Linnæus hazarded a conjecture that hops, spinage, chenopodium, tarragon, and many other garden vegetables were brought to Europe by the Goths, during their periods of emigration, from Russia and particularly the Ukraine, because the old writers make no mention of these plants, and because in those districts they all grow wild at present[956 - Linnæi Amœnitat. Academ. vii. p. 452.]. It however appears certain that hops belong to our indigenous plants, as they grow everywhere wild in Germany, Switzerland, England, and Sweden, and even in countries into which the cultivation of them has never yet been introduced, and where it cannot be supposed that they accidentally became wild by being conveyed from hop-fields and gardens. The want of information in works older than the emigrations of the northern tribes, is no proof that a plant did not then exist. At that time there was no Linnæus to transmit plants to posterity, as Hipparchus, according to the expression of Pliny, did the stars. Such vegetable productions only as had become remarkable on account of their utility or hurtful qualities, or by some singular circumstance, occur in the works of the ancients. Many others remained unknown, or at least without names, till natural history acquired a systematic form; and even at present botanists have often the satisfaction to discover some plant not before observed.

Is it probable that the Chinese even are acquainted with our hops? They have a kind of beer made from barley and wheat, which is called tarasun; and according to the account of J. G. Gmelin, who purposely made himself acquainted with the preparation of it, hops formed by pressure into masses, shaped like a brick, are added to it[957 - Gmelin’s Reise durch Sibirien. Gött. 1752, 8vo, iii. p. 55.]. It is well known that the Chinese have also a kind of tea formed into cakes by strong pressure. Our hops are compressed in the same manner in Bohemia; and in that state will keep without losing any of their strength for fifty years. They are put into a sack or bag of coarse canvass, and subjected to a press. A square sewed bag, each side of which is two ells, contains fifty bushels of hops prepared in this manner; and when any of them are required for brewing, the bag is made fast to a beam, and as much as may be necessary is cut out with an axe. The whole mass is of a brown colour, and has a resemblance to pitch, in which not a single hop-leaf can be distinguished. Whether the Chinese conceived the idea of employing our common hops for the like purpose, is a question of some importance in regard to the history of them; but at present I am not able to answer it.

[Hops are extensively cultivated in Kent, Sussex, and Herefordshire; and to a less extent in Worcestershire, Wiltshire, Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Surrey, and several other counties.

From 50,000 to 60,000 acres of land are covered in England with hop-gardens, about one-half being in Kent; an excise duty of 18s. 8d. per cwt. is levied upon their produce. British hops are exported to Hamburg, Antwerp, St. Petersburg, New York, Australia, and other places. A trifling quantity is also imported, principally from Flanders. The duty on hops of the growth of Great Britain produced in 1842, £260,979.]

BLACK LEAD

To ascertain how old the use of black lead is for writing might be of some importance in diplomatics, as the antiquity of manuscripts ruled or written with this substance, or of drawings made with it, could then be determined.

I allude here to pencils formed of that mineral called, in common, plumbago and molybdæna, though a distinction is now made between these names by mineralogists. The mineral used for black-lead pencils they call reissbley, plumbago, or graphites; but under the term wasserbley and molybdæna they understand a mineral once considered to be the same as the former, but which, however like it may be in appearance, differs from it in being heavier, occurring much seldomer, and containing a new metal, almost of a steel-grey colour, exceedingly brittle, and named molybdænum. Plumbago, which is the substance here meant, when exposed to an open fire, is almost entirely consumed, leaving nothing but a little iron and siliceous earth. It contains no lead; and the names reissbley and bleystift have no other foundation than the lead-coloured traces which it leaves upon paper. The darker, finer, and cleaner the lines it makes are, the fitter it is for drawing and writing. These lines are durable, and do not readily fade; but when one chooses, they may be readily rubbed out. Black lead, therefore, can be used with more convenience and speed than any coloured earth, charcoal, or even ink.

It is well known that transcribers, more than a thousand years ago, when they wished their writing to be in a particular manner beautiful and regular, drew fine parallel lines, which they followed in writing. These lines may be still clearly distinguished in old manuscripts. In many instances, they have only been impressed on the parchment by some hard, sharp body; but they often exhibit a leaden colour; from which one might suppose that they had been drawn with our plumbago, and consequently believe that the use of this substance is as old as we must consider, from certain marks, the oldest ruled manuscripts. But, on a little reflection, one will be convinced that this would be a very fallacious conclusion. For lines so like those made with plumbago, that the eye can scarcely perceive the difference, may be made with lead[958 - Plin. lib. xxxiii. 3, sect. 19.].

It can be proved that the ancients drew their lines with lead; and this could be done with more convenience, as this soft metal was easily rubbed off by the parchment, which, being harder and rougher than our paper, had therefore more body. It is well known that, formerly, when people wished to draw lines, a small round plate of lead, which could not so readily cut the parchment or become bent as a leaden style, was employed[959 - A plate of this kind was called παράγραφος, also τροχαλὸς, γυρὸς, κυκλοτερὴς, which last appellation denotes the form. The Romans, at least those of later times, named this lead præductal. The ruler by which the lines were drawn was called κανὼν and κανονίς. Thus the ruled sheet which Suffenus filled with wretched verses is styled by Catullus membrana directa plumbo. Pollux has παραγράφειν τῇ παραγραφίδι. See Salmasius ad Solinum, p. 644, where some passages, in which these leaden plates are described, are quoted from the Anthologia.].

Old manuscripts, ruled with lead-coloured lines, have been pointed out by modern diplomatists. Our learned Professor Schönemann, who was unfortunately hurried off by a premature death, has given a description of the Codex Berengaris Turonensis, of the eleventh or twelfth century, and the Codex Theophyli Presbyteri de Temperamento Colorum of the latter century, both preserved in the library of Wolfenbuttel; and remarks that lines are drawn on the first partly with a style and partly in a light manner with lead; but he says of the other, that it exhibits very fine lines drawn with a black-lead pencil[960 - Versuchs e. System d. Diplomatik. Hamb. 1802, 8vo, ii. p. 108.]. Le Moine quotes a document of the year 1387, which is ruled with black lead, and at the same time says that the custom of ruling ceased about the year 1421 and 1424. The lines, therefore, after that period, became crooked and oblique[961 - Diplomatique-pratique: à Metz, 1765, 4to, p. 62.].

But the antiquity of black-lead pencils cannot be determined by the help of diplomatic documents. It might be traced out with more ease were it known by what mineralogical writer plumbago, and the uses of it, were first mentioned. The following is what I have remarked on this subject; but I suspect that there must be some older mention of it than any I have yet been able to find. I do not, however, believe that those who require more than bare conjecture will discover this mineral in the works of the Greeks and the Romans; for it cannot possibly be proved that it is to be understood under the terms plumbago, galena, molybdæna, and molybdoides, as has been confidently asserted by many, who, were it not superfluous, might easily be refuted. But in whatever obscurity these names may be involved, one can with certainty discover that they sometimes denote galena, or a real lead ore, or else some production of lead works.

The first author in whose writings I have as yet found certain mention of plumbago is Conrad Gesner, whose name I can never pronounce without respect. In his book on fossils, printed at Zurich in 1565, he says that people had pencils for writing which consisted of a wooden handle, with a piece of lead, or, as he believed, an artificial mixture, called by some stimmi Anglicanum. Such pencils must at that time have been scarce, because he has given a figure of them in a wood-cut. To judge by this, the pencil seems to have had a wooden sheath or covering.

Thirty years after, Cæsalpinus gave a more complete account of this mineral, which he calls molybdoides, because he thinks it was so named by Dioscorides. He says that it was a lead-coloured shining stone, as smooth as if rubbed over with oil; it gave to the fingers an ash-grey tint, with a plumbeous lustre, and pointed pencils were made of it for the use of painters and draftsmen. He adds, that it was called Flanders’ stone, because it was brought from the Netherlands to Italy[962 - De Metallicis, lib. iii. Rome, 1596, or Norib. 1602.].

Three years after Cæsalpinus, a still better description was given by Imperato. The latter calls the black lead grafio piombino, and says that it is much more convenient for drawing than pen and ink, because the marks made with it appear not only on a white ground, but, in consequence of their brightness, show themselves also on black; because they can be preserved or rubbed out at pleasure; and because one can retrace them with a pen, which drawings made with lead or charcoal will not admit[963 - This, however, is not exactly the case. With ink somewhat thick one may indeed write on a piece of paper which has been rubbed over with black lead.]. This mineral is smooth; appears greasy to the touch, and has a leaden colour, which it communicates with a sort of metallic lustre. It can resist for a long time the strongest fire; it even acquires in it more hardness, and therefore has been considered as a kind of talc. Sometimes it is foliaceous, and may be crumbled to pieces in scales; but it is frequently found denser and stronger, and in this case writing-pencils are made of it. The first kind was mixed with that clay called rubrica, and manufactured into crucibles, which were exceedingly durable in the fire. It is here seen that these Italians, at that time, were well acquainted with this mineral. It has been reckoned a species of talc by Justi, by Wallerius in the first edition of his mineralogy, and also by others. Its durability in resisting heat is certainly manifested, when it is kept in a close fire and between coals. But it is proved by the experiments of modern mineralogists, that in an open, strong, and long-continued fire, it becomes almost entirely consumed.

Bartholomew Ambrosinus, in the continuation of Aldrovandi’s Musæum Metallicum, printed at Bologna in 1648, uses the name lapis plumbarius. The short account which he gives of it has been borrowed from the two Italians last mentioned; but it deserves to be remarked, that even then he thought it worth his while to give Gesner’s figure enlarged.

In the works of Albertus Magnus, George Agricola, Encelius, Cæsius, Kircher, and many other old mineralogists, I have found no mention of black lead. But as the advantageous use of it for crucibles was known to Imperato, and as the crucibles made at Ips, which till very lately were employed by all the mints in Europe, and even in other parts, derived their superiority from plumbago being mixed with the blue clay, and as these crucibles are introduced more than once by Agricola without any mention of the addition, it must either at that time have not been usual, or it must have escaped the notice of this diligent man. How old then are the pits at Leizersdorf, which furnish plumbago for the crucibles of Ips or Passau? I know of one mineralogist only who has described that district, but on this subject he has given us no information.

I am equally unacquainted with the time when the pits in Cumberland, which, as is well known, produce the best plumbago, were discovered. They are situated on the Borrowdale mountains, about ten miles from the town of Keswick. The families to whom these pits belong, according to an established regulation, can open them only once every seven years, and take out but a certain quantity of the mineral, in order to keep up the price, and prevent the pits from being exhausted[964 - [This was formerly the case, but for a considerable number of years past the mine has been constantly open. The whole of the produce is sent up to London (Essex Street, Strand), where it is disposed of by public auction, held once a month.]]. This production is called there black lead, kellow or killow, wad or wadt, which words properly mean black[965 - In the Cumberland dialect, killow or collow, as well as wad, means black. Therefore when the manganese earth, which is found chiefly at Elton not far from Winster, and when burnt is employed as an oil-colour, but particularly for daubing over ships, is called black wad, that expression signifies as much as black black. See Pennant’s Tour in Scotland, i. p. 42. Gentleman’s Magazine, 1747, p. 583.]. I have found no older information in regard to these pits than that of Merret, who wrote in the year 1667, and who calls this mineral nigrica fabrilis, because it had then no Latin name[966 - Pinax Rerum Natural. London, 1667, 8vo, p. 218.]. Pettus remarked, in his Fleta Minor, published 1683, that the pencils made from it were inclosed in fir or cedar. It is related by Robinson[967 - Natural Hist. of Westm. and Cumberland, 1709, 8vo, p. 74. See also Gent.’s Mag. xxi. 1751, p. 51, where there is a map of this remarkable district.] and others, that at first the country-people around Keswick marked their sheep with it. Afterwards the art was discovered of employing it for earthenware, and for preserving iron from rust. The last-mentioned author says also, that it is used by the Dutch in dyeing, in order to render black more durable, and that it is bought up by them in large quantities for that purpose. But this is only a pretence. I am inclined to think that they prepare from it black-lead pencils.