Adulteration is a term not only applied in its proper sense to the fraudulent mixture of articles of commerce, food, drink, drugs, seeds, etc, with noxious or inferior ingredients, but also by magistrates and analysts to accidental impurity, and even in some cases to actual substitution.
The chief objects of adulteration are to increase the weight or volume of the article, to give a colour which either makes a good article more pleasing to the eye or else disguises an inferior one, to substitute a cheaper form of the article, or the same substance from which the strength has been extracted, or to give it a false strength.
Among the adulterations which were commonly practised around 1905 for the purpose of fraudulently increasing the weight or volume of an article are the following: Bread was adulterated with alum or sulphate of copper, which gives solidity to the gluten of damaged or inferior flour; with chalk or carbonate of soda to correct the acidity of such flour; and with boiled rice or potatoes, which enables the bread to carry more water, and thus to produce a larger number of loaves from a given quantity of flour. Wheatflour is adulterated with other inferior flours, as the flour from rice, bean, Indian-corn, potato, and with sulphate of lime, alum, etc. Milk was usually adulterated with water. The adulterations generally present in butter consisted of an undue proportion of salt and water, lard, tallow, and other fats; when of poor quality it was frequently coloured with a little annatto, and, at times, with the juice of carrots. Genuine butter should not contain less than 80 percent of butter-fat. Cheese was also coloured with annatto and other substances. Tea was adulterated chiefly in China with sand, iron-filings, chalk, gypsum, Chinaclay, exhausted tea leaves, and the leaves of the sycamore, horse-chestnut, and plum, whilst colour and weight were added by black-lead, indigo, Prussian-blue (one of the deleterious ingredients used by the Chinese in converting the lowest qualities of black into green teas), gum, turmeric, soapstone, catechu, and other substances.
Confections were adulterated with flour and sulphate of lime. Preserved vegetables were kept green and poisoned by salts of copper. The acridity of mustard is commonly reduced by flour, and the colour of the compound is improved by turmeric. Pepper was adulterated with linseed-meal, flour, mustard husks, etc. Colour was given to pickles by salts of copper, acetate of copper, etc. Ale was adulterated with common salt, Cocculus Indicus, grains of paradise, quassia, and other bitters, sulphate of iron, alum, etc. Porter and stout were mixed with sugar, treacle, salt, and an excess of water. Brandy was diluted with water, and burned sugar was added to improve the colour; sometimes bad whisky was flavoured and coloured so as to resemble brandy, and sold under its name.
Gin was mixed with excess of water, and flavouring matters of various kinds, with alum and tartar, were added. Rum was diluted with water, and the flavour and colour kept up by the addition of cayenne and burned sugar. For champagnegooseberry and other inferior wines were often substituted. Port was manufactured from red Cape and other inferior wines, the body, flavour, strength, and colour being produced by gum-dragon, the washings of brandy casks, and a preparation of German bilberries. Cheap brown sherry was mixed with Cape and other low-priced brandies, and was flavoured with the washings of brandy casks, sugar-candy, and bitter almonds. Pale sherries were produced by gypsum, by a process called plastering, which removes the natural acids as well as the colour of the wine. Other wines were adulterated with elderberry, logwood, Brazil-wood, cudbear, red beetroot, etc, for colour; with lime or carbonate of lime, carbonate of soda, carbonate of potash, and litharge, to correct acidity; with catechu, sloe-leaves, and oak-bark for astringency; with sulphate of lime and alum for removing colour; with cane-sugar for giving sweetness and body; with alcohol for fortifying; and with ether, especially acetic ether, for giving bouquet and flavour.
Medicines, such as jalap, opium, rhubarb, cinchonabark, scammony, aloes, sarsaparilla, squills, etc, were mixed with various foreign substances. Castor-oil has been adulterated with other oils; and inferior oils were often. mixed with cod-liver oil. Cantharides were often mixed with golden-beetle and also artificially-coloured glass.
The adulteration of seeds was largely practised also, the seed which forms the adulterant being of course of the most worthless kind that can be had. Thus turnip-seed was mixed with rape, wild mustard, or charlock, which are steamed and kiln-dried to destroy their vitality, so as to evade detection in the progress of growth; old and useless turnip-seed was also used fraudulently mixed with fresh seeds. Clover was also much mixed with plantain and mere weeds.
Acts against adulteration have been passed in various countries and at various times. In Britain there was a law against it as early as 1267. Research Adulteration
Belomancy is divination by means of arrows. Labels are attached to the arrows, and fired by archers. The arrow which lands furthest away has its label read, and the advice upon it acted upon. The practice of belomancy originated with the Greeks and around 1900 was reported as commonplace among the Arabs by Brewer. Research Belomancy
The Broad Arrow is a symbol used as a royal mark on government stores. It was the cognisance of Viscount Sydney, Earl of Romney, who was the master- general of the Ordnance from 1693 to 1702. Research Broad Arrow
Elf-bolt (also elf-arrow, elfer-stone and fairy-dart) was a name given to the flintarrow heads found in Britain. It was thought that these were fired by elves at domesticated animals. Research Elf-bolt
Flint Implements were used by man while unacquainted with the use of metals. For such implements other hard stones were also used, but the most numerous were formed of flint. They consist of arrow-heads, axe-heads, lance-beads, knives, scrapers, etc. Those of the palaeolithic period were unpolished, those of the neolithic polished. Flint implements were still used by some aboriginal tribes at the start of the 20th century, and research and field tests conducted during the 20th century revealed that flint implements can be very effective, as effective or even more so than their metal counterparts for some tasks. Research Flint Implements
African Arrow-Poison (Strophanthus Kombe) is a climbing shrub of the natural order Apocynaceae, native to tropical Africa. It has opposite oval leaves and funnel-shaped flowers. The fruits are woody pods, 25 cm long, filled with yellow seeds, each furnished with a tuft of silky hairs. From the silky seed-coat may be extracted a deadly poison (of which the active principle is strophantin) which is used to smear arrow tips. Research African Arrow-Poison
Alismacese is the water-plantain family, a natural order of endogenous plants, the members of which are herbaceous, annual or perennial; with petiolate leaves sheathing at the base, hermaphrodite (rarely unisexual) flowers, disposed in spikes, panicles, or racemes. They are floating or marsh plants, and many have edible fleshy rhizomes, They are found in all countries, but especially in Europe and North America, where their rather brilliant flowers adorn the pools and streams. The principal genera are Alisma (water-plaintain) and Sagittaria (arrow-head). Research Alismaceae
Arum is a genus of plants of the natural order Aracese. Arum maculatum (the common wake-robin, or lords-and-ladies) is abundant in woods and hedges in England and Ireland. It has acrid properties, but its corm yields a starch, which is known by the name of Portlandsago or arrow-root. At one time this was prepared to a considerable extent in Portland Island. All the species of this genus develop much heat during flowering. Research Arum
Belemnites are extinct, squid-like molluscs of the Cephalopoda class with a bullet-shaped internal shell. Fossils are found from the Upper Carboniferous period to the Eocene epoch. The fossils are straight, solid, tapering and dart-shaped, and were formerly popularly known as arrow-heads, thunderbolts, finger-stones, etc. Research Belemnite
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Adulteration
