In The Meantime, I Had Made Myself Excessively Comfortable; We Were In A
Beautiful And Highly Cultivated District, In The Midst Of Immense Fields
Of Sweet Potatoes.
The idea struck me that I could manufacture spirit
from this source, as they were so excessively sweet as to be
disagreeable as a vegetable.
Accordingly I collected a great number of
large jars that were used by the natives for brewing merissa; in these I
boiled several hundredweight of potatoes to a pulp. There were jars
containing about twenty gallons; these I filled with the pulp mashed
with water, to which I added yeast from a brewing of merissa. While this
mixture was fermenting I constructed my still, by fixing a jar of about
twelve gallons on a neat furnace of clay, and inserting the mouth of a
smaller jar upon the top; the smaller jar thus inverted became the dome
of the still. In the top of this I bored a hole, in which I fitted a
long reed of about an inch in diameter, which descended to my condenser;
the latter was the kettle, sunk by a weight in a large pan of cold
water.
My still worked beautifully, and produced four or five bottles of good
spirit daily; - this I stored in large bottle gourds, containing about
four gallons each. My men were excessively fond of attending to the
distillery, especially Richarn, who took a deep interest in the
operation, but who was frequently found dead asleep on his back; the
fire out; and the still at a standstill.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 563 of 662
Words from 151652 to 151911
of 178435
