Note 179 — Chapter VII · New Process for the Manufacture of Beer.

We have remarked in our observations on No. 6 of Plate I. (p. 6) that amongst the amorphous granular deposits of wort and beer we often find minute balls of resinous and colouring matter, perfectly spherical and very dense, which if the liquids be shaken up will render them very turbid, but which readily and rapidly deposit again, without remaining in suspension in the least. Such then is the form in which the deposits of wort in course of fermentation are precipitated, when the wort has been freely exposed to oxygen. One day in the laboratory we were desirous of starting a fermentation in a vessel capable of holding 12 hectolitres (264 gallons). But as we only had at our disposal a copper capable of holding 2-½ hectolitres, we procured the wort from a neighbouring brewery in two barrels of 6 hectolitres each. This wort we re-heated, in portions, in our 2-½ hectolitre copper, a treatment which had the effect of oxidizing the wort more than it would have been in the brewery. In this case the beer fell remarkably bright, and the cells of yeast were accompanied by the deposit of minute agglomerations sketched in Plate I., No. 6. We have repeated this experiment on a smaller scale and have obtained the same result.