CHAIN LIGHTNING.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume IX, Issue 693, 18 June 1903, Page 23

CHAIN LIGHTNING.

The IxmdoD " Daily Telegraph ” iq spomrible for the following, given on that authority of a Government official ° In one year over three millions of gallons ivt the foulest spirit—only fit or methylatittri —were imported jfrom Germany, of which two-thirds, costing from fid to nd a gaff* lon, were admittedly used for drinking. K is only from abroad that this miserably destructive stuff is imported. In this comstry a spirit is distilled from damaged Indian com, or from decomposed the dregs of the sugar refineries, which le mixed with the real thing and sold acrocn the counter as ' genuine Scotch ’ W ‘ Irish.’ Very often not more than one cask; of real Scotch or Irish goes to make up the blend; the rest, in any proportion! that the blender likes—thirty, forty, or fifty casks—being composed of this fiery stuff.” There is something radically; and reformably wrong,”, says the “Telegraph,” “ when a Government official can tell us of the following case, of which he had direct cognisance. * Spirit of a verylow class,’ he says, ‘ made in England, was warehoused in a Government warehouse in Scotland, and there simply coloured (not a drop of Scotch added), made up into small pocket-flasks, and then labelled ‘ Fine old Scotch.’ But this wae not all. A chemist’s certificate of analysis was affixed, vouching for its mellowness and all the other good (qualities which it did not possess. It was then sent out to one of our colonies to a publican, who receives periodical cinsignments, I believe, up to this day.’ ”