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[-208-]
LONDON STOUT.
On of the earliest things to strike the attention of our
country-cousins is the universal appearance of the names
of certain firms, painted in the largest letters upon the
most florid backgrounds of the numerous public-house signs of the metropolis. "What does 'Reid's Entire'
mean?" asked a fair friend of ours the other day, looking
up with her brown eyes, as though she had asked something
very foolish, and pointing to the puzzling inscription
upon a neighbouring signboard. And, no doubt, a similar
question arises in the minds of more worldly-wise people,
and passes out again unanswered. Henceforth then, good
people all, know that the word "entire" arose in the
following manner:— Prior to the year 1730, publicans
were in the habit of selling ale, beer, and twopenny, and
the "thirsty souls" of that day were accustomed to combine
either of these in a drink called half-and-half. From
this they proceeded to spin "three threads" as they called
it, or to have their glasses filled from each of the three
taps. In the year 1730, however, a certain publican
named Horwood, to save himself the trouble of making
this triune mixture, brewed a liquor intended to imitate
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the taste of the "three threads," and to this he applied the
term "entire." This concoction was approved, and· being
puffed as good porters' drink, it speedily came to be called
porter itself. The universal diffusion of this mild stimulant
is indicated by other means, however, than the signs;
you cannot go along a quiet street but you either see the
potman, with his little rack of quart mugs brimmed with
the frothy liquid, or rattling the shiny pots against the
rails by their suspending strap; you cannot pass in between
the ever-opening doors of the public without seeing
the dilated eyes of some "thirsty soul" as he drinks,
peering over the rim of the nigh-exhausted pewter.
Great is the demand thereof; whence comes the supply?
From what porterian springs issue these dark and foam-crowned
floods ?
To find one of these, our attention was the other day
directed into that neighbourhood of the metropolis where,
through the large glazed attic-windows, we see the glowing
silks and satins just issuing new-born from the loom. In the
very midst of Spitalfields stands the enormous brewery of
the Messrs. Truman, Hanbury, Buxton, and Co., which covers nearly six acres of
ground, and which, looked at from above, has more the appearance of a town
itself than of a private manufacturing establishment.
Let us then enter this great establishment, and witness
the Brobdignagian brew which is perpetually going on there.
The first thing that strikes the spectator's attention is, the
total revolution which takes place in his own mind as regards
his own proper dimensions, and of those of his kind
who are moving about. A stalwart six-foot drayman, with
a pair of shoulders worthy of Atlas, shrinks down in the
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great brewhouse to the size of a pigmy. All familiar
ideas of the relative proportion of things give way at once
to a confused sort of thought that the kingdom of Brobdignag is come again, and that the little mites we see
about are so many Gullivers. What other feeling can a
man entertain who travels round the beer barrels of the
establishment, by means of iron-staircases, and, after an
exhausting climb, peeps fearfully into the interior with the
same sort of giddy sensation with which he looks down the
shaft of the Thames Tunnel? The largest of these vessels are termed the mash-tuns; of these there are two,
each containing 800 barrels of the ordinary dimensions.
In these the malt and hops are boiled, after being mashed
up with hot water, the process of mashing being performed
by a revolving spindle, with huge arms, exactly like a
chocolate mill. Steam is, of course, the great arm which
works incessantly the Titanic implements. Steam, in
fact, does everything; it lifts the malt up from the waggons into the lofts by means of a Jacob's ladder, or
collection of little boxes working upon an endless gutta percha chain; it removes it from one granary to another
by means of an Archimedian screw, working in a long cylinder;
it lifts the barrels up an inclined plane; it cleans
the dirty ones in a very singular manner, as we shall show
by-and-by; it attends to the fires, and thus keeps up its
own constitution; it stirs with a great spoon the malt and
the hops; and pumps, day and night, floods of liquor from
one brewhouse to another.
After the process of mashing, the wort is pumped up
into a large copper, of which there are five, containing
from 300 to 400 barrels each, where the -wort is boiled
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with the hops, of which often two tons are used in a day.
We may observe that, many years ago, one of the brewers'
men had the misfortune to fall into one of these tuns, and
was, of course, instantly destroyed. On this occasion, the
whole contents of the vessel, to the amount of 800 barrels,
was immediately allowed to flow into the gutters, at a loss
to the firm of 1,000l. at least, a fact which does the
greatest credit to the good feeling of this princely house.
The boiling beer is now pumped up to the coolers. To get
a sight of these, the visitor has to perform a climbing process
similar to that required to get at the upper gallery of
St. Paul's, and, when he has reached the highest point
ladders are capable of taking him, he finds his nose on a
level with a black sea, whose area presents a surface of
32,000 square feet. This large surface is partly open to
the air, and to the soot, of which, of course, it would receive
a large deposit under the ordinary circumstances of
factory chimneys pouring out volumes of smoke; but we
shall have to explain, by-and-by, how it is that in this
brewery at least smoke is not. From the coolers the beer
runs down into four enormous vats, each of which contains
no less that 50,000 gallons. These four vats are ranged
side by side, and towards the upper half an iron gallery
runs so as to give the brewers' men access to the apertures
by which their interiors are viewed. These apertures are
square, and about the size of the port of a man-of-war,
having sliding-shutters so adjusted that the vat can be
filled without leaking. As you walk along this gallery,
and look into these ports, it seems as though you were looking into the hold of a hundred and twenty gun-ship,
except that about half-way down the black porter is seen,
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with huge floating islands of barm, which revolve round
and round, like the foam in some deep, dark pool at the
foot of a cataract. The fermenting process is allowed to
go on here for two nights and a day, and consequently an
immense quantity of carbonic acid gas is developed, which,
however, on account of its density, always keeps as close
as possible to the surface of the liquid; the men can detect
the height to which it has risen to within an inch or
two with the bare hand, which immediately becomes
sensible of the thick warm feel of this poisonous vapour. When the fermentation has proceeded a sufficient length
of time, the beer is drained into what may be termed
yeast-traps, or into a long double row of smaller vats,
called Rounds, the partially-opened lids of which communicate with a wooden trough running down the middle
of the row.
As the beer rises to the top of these receptacles it lifts
up the yeast, which no sooner reaches the level of the side-shoots
running into the central trough than off it goes,
and in this manner immense quantities of yeast are
speedily cleared away by the force of its own gravity. It
has always been a matter of wonder to us how the brewers can keep the yeast under, considering the extraordinary
manner in which the parasite multiplies itself under
favourable circumstances. However, the world is not
deluged with yeast, so, we suppose, our fears are groundless;
the distillers, we are given to understand, take all
the surplus produced by the brewing process. The beer is
now thoroughly concocted, and it only requires storing in
order that it may ripen before it is distributed. The time
that it is necessary to store it depends on its destination;
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that which has to go into the country or abroad requiring
a longer period of rest than that which is to be consumed
immediately.
But the storing vats! — these are sights indeed. The
spectator sees vista after vista opening upon him, long-drawn
aisles of porter vats, a pillared shade of stout. Of
these vats, supported upon iron columns, there are no less
than 134, and when full they hold the enormous quantity
of 3,500,000 gallons of porter. The Messrs. Hanbury
and Co. brewed one year no less than 400,000 barrels of
ale and porter, or twenty-five million tumblers, more than
enough to float a seventy-four gun-ship. It is generally
supposed that the great brewers get their supplies of water
from the Thames, and that the very impurities of the king
of rivers gives that "body" to the liquor, to which its
filling properties are attributed. This is a vulgar error;
not even the brewers who live upon the stream use its
polluted waters, but obtain their supplies from Artesian
wells sunk to a very considerable depth; the well at Meesrs. Hanbury's is 520 feet deep, and those of other
brewers, according to their size, are of a proportionate
depth. It might be imagined that the immense supplies
drawn from these wells in the brewery under notice it is
more than half a million barrels a year must have a very
great effect upon the shallower wells of houses and smaller
factories. The water beneath London has, within the last
twenty-five years, sunk as many feet; and it is stated
among the trade that the Artesian streams of the great
breweries, situated upon opposite sides of the Thames, and
more than half a mile apart, at one time so affected each
other, that they were obliged to obtain their supplies on [-214-]
alternate days. If the fall of water underneath London
has been so great, however, it is gratifying to know that it
has been serviceably used on the surface, in nourishing the
bodies and cleansing the skins of such a vast population
as we find living in the metropolis.
The Messrs. Hanbury are both porter and ale brewers; some houses, such as Meux and Co., and Reid and Co.,
brew porter alone. The popular idea seems to be that
there is some considerable difference in the method of
manufacturing the two liquids, but this is not the case; the dark colour of the porter is entirely owing to the malt
being charred in the kiln, instead of simply dried.
By Act of Parliament beer and porter can only be made
of malt and hops, the great council of the nation having
omitted all mention of the water; but the brewers, we
suppose, may be pardoned for the illegal addition of so
necessary an ingredient.
Malt and hops, as might be imagined, constitute an
enormous item in the manufacture of the beer of the
metropolis. The house of Hanbury and Co. alone pay
upwards of half a million annually for the malt and hops
they consume. To procure this ingredient in its best condition,
great care is taken by all the large brewers. Agents
are located in the three eastern counties, which are the
principal home of John Barleycorn: these attend the
markets, carefully select the best samples, and malt it for
their employers, charging a commission for their trouble.
The malt is sent up to London as it is required, and stored
in the bins of the establishment. These bins are in due
proportion to the enormous size of the establishment, each
one measuring twenty feet across, and about thirty-five
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feet deep. The hops employed by the brewers are obtained
directly from the hop-merchants. As they cannot
be adulterated, not so much care is necessary in the agency
by which they are obtained.
Having taken a hasty glance of the manner in which
ale and porter are produced, let us examine the means by
which they are distributed. As soon as the liquid is sufficiently
ripe, it is racked off from the enormous store-vats,
which we have before described, into casks such as ordinary
mortals are accustomed to behold. Of these, of course,
there is always an enormous number on the establishment
of the Messrs. Hanbury; there were no less than 80,000
belonging to the establishment when we visited it; each
of these casks, when new, is worth a guinea, so that here
alone we have 84,000l. worth of property employed. Few
of these casks are manufactured on the premises, but they
are all repaired and cleaned here, after they have been returned
from the publicans. It is a curious sight to see the
enormous number of barrels piled in the yard, and the
active detachment of coopers, of whom there are sixty-six,
hammering and fitting, and walking round and round at
their work. Some of the barrels smell so horribly that
they are obliged to be broken up; the most charitable
idea is, that they must have been used by the publicans as
wash-tubs or dog-kennels. The manner in which the insides
of the casks are made sweet is one of the most
observable things in the brewery. You see in the distance
a multitude of casks, in a double row, waltzing, and
tumbling, and performing a number of gymnastic feats, as though they were
practising for the profession of the acrobat. All this goes on under a clinking
of chains such as
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a score of Macheaths would make dancing in fetters. On
a stricter examination, you perceive that steam machinery
is here brought into play to supersede human labour.
The casks are placed in iron frames, which rotate in every
conceivable manner; and whilst these gyrations are going
on, you hear a rumbling in the interior of each barrel,
which testifies to an internal agony of no ordinary kind.
On inquiring what caused these dismal moans, the gentleman
who kindly showed us round the establishment
mildly drew forth from a bunghole about a couple of yards of chain, studded with sharp cones, and explained how religiously
these cones went into the corners, and worked
about every inch of the interior of the devoted cask. We
think it a pity that the ingenious engineer who devised
this apparatus had not lived in the dark ages, to have
exerted his skill in constructing refined torturing instruments
for the benefit of the poor enduring mortals of that
period. He is throwing himself away upon barrels, that
is clear.
To convey these barrels, when filled, to the publicans,
we have the splendid stud of horses fitted to draw such
noble liquor, and the army of draymen worthy to drive
them:-
"He who drives fat oxen
Should himself be fat."
The stables of these horses are the most interesting show-places
of the establishment, especially to the ladies. There are two of these, containing stallage for 130 horses,
the number employed by the firm. Over the rack of each
stall, the name of the horse is painted, and here you see
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Heroes, Dukes, Wellingtons, Milkmaids, Alexanders,
Smilers; &c. eating away in profound ignorance of the
honourable and pleasant names they bear. These are,
however, only show names; each horse, it is true, always
goes, when at home, under his label, but the drayman
has generally a pet name of his own, to which they
affectionately answer. These fine animals come principally
from Lincolnshire, and are, we imagine, of Flemish
origin; they cost, on an average, 70l. each, and last seven
years. People imagine that they get so fat on the grains
of the brewery, but this is an error; they are fed on the
best oats, and work accordingly. The intelligence of these animals must
have often been remarked by the reader as he has passed along and observed them
pulling the empty barrels out of the publicans' cellars, which is, by the bye,
tougher work than it looks, and there have been many
instances of horses having been dragged into the vaults by
the weight of some of the heavier casks. These beasts
are by nature good-tempered, but many of them become
completely soured by little boys, who steal horse hairs from
their long tails, to make fishing lines, while the draymen
are down in the publicans' cellars.
The draymen of this establishment are eighty in
number. Perhaps these brewers' labourers are the most
powerful body of men in existence. They are taller than
the guardsmen, and heavier by a couple of stone. The
dress of the drayman is peculiar: he wears a large loose
smock frock extending to the knees, and over this a thick
leathern kind of tippet, which covers the shoulders, and
comes down in front like an apron. The simple line of ,
the costume makes the man appear still taller than he is.
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The size of these men is not owing to the unlimited beer which it is popularly supposed they have at command.
They are all picked on account of their inches, and are
limited to a certain amount of free stout every day. The
extensive stock of horses kept here necessitates a number
of stable attendants; of these and farriers there are
twenty-one, so that the Messrs. Hanbury and Co. could,
if they pleased, furnish a troop of the very heaviest cavalry at a moment's notice.
Let us, by way of contrast, pass from the dray-horses and
the draymen which "are of the earth, earthy" into the
painters shop of the establishment, or rather into the
artist's studio, for here it is not only a mere matter of
letter-painting we have to contemplate, but the fine arts!
The mere painter's shop, it is true, is full of nothing but
"Truman, Hanbury, and Buxton's Entire," "Truman,
Hanbury, and Buxton's Ale," &c., painted on the brightest
of backgrounds; but there is a little sanctum, wherein
the fancy-work is done. When we entered this, we beheld
the artist pleasantly contemplating the picture of a camel-leopard cropping the
branches of an overhanging tree, and very well it was done, too; and so we told
our friend, who, with palette in hand, informed us it was for the sign of the
tavern in the immediate vicinity of the Surrey Zoological Gardens. The artist,
no doubt, dwelt over the work with the more care, in order that no disparaging
remarks might be made by persons who might have had an opportunity of seeing the
spotted and tawny original so close at hand. The line taken by Messrs. Hanbury's painter does not
, appear to be very clearly defined. We were afraid to ask
him how many Red Lions he had painted in his time, or
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how finished he had become in portraits of the Marquis of
Granby. We can answer, however, for his proficiency in
the subject of White Harts, and he was putting the last
touch of gilt upon a gigantic carved bunch of grapes, with
all the artistic sensitiveness of a Lance.
The large brewers of the metropolis always furnish the
signs to the publicans who sell their beer and porter.
We were informed at Messrs. Hanbury's that they had
sent out that year 400 new ones, and repaired 350, at a
cost of 1,300l.; these sign-boards remain the property of
the brewers supplying them. Many people have an idea
that the great brewers take and entirely furnish taverns
for those who will become agents for the sale of their beer;
this is another popular error. The brewers, however, are
in the habit of advancing a sum of money on the publican's
lease, but no bargain is entered into, we have been
given to understand, by which the publican is compelled,
in return, to sell their goods; if, however, the brewer holds
the lease, that follows as a matter of course. It is obviously
to the advantage of the brewers to obtain trustworthy
venders for their ale and porter, as their names stand as
guarantees of the goodness of the article sold within, and
a dishonest man has it in his power to damage a brewer in
the public estimation by adulterating his beer. This may
be done in many ways; firstly, by simply sugaring and
watering it, the commonest method of all; secondly, by
dosing it with salt and tobacco, in order that the toper's "appetite may grow with that it feeds on;" and thirdly,
by embittering it with quassia, in order to give it a hoppy
flavour. The idea that ale is sometimes adulterated with
strychnine, a little time ago very prevalent, was quite a
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mistaken one, as that drug is by far too expensive to bet
used for such a purpose.
To return, however, to our subject. .From what we have
said, it will be seen that the Messrs. Hanbury are, in
fact, to a very great extent, their own tradesmen. Thus
there is a cooperage, a farrier's shop, a millwright's shop,
a carpenter's shop, a wheelwright's shop, and a painter's
shop, and a little artist's studio. The different buildings in
which all these trades are carried on surround the central
yard, or beer-barrel depot, and they make up, in short,
a very respectable village. Here is a list of this little industrial
army:-
Brewers' men and stokers ...
35
Mill-loft men ... 7
Draymen ... 80
Storehousemen ... 39
Coopers
... 66
Stablemen and farriers ... 21
Millwrights and engine-drivers
... 17
Carpenters and brickmakers ... 32
Wheelwrights
... 4
Painters ... 18
Bricklayers ... 40
[Total] 359
This number is exclusive of the higher class of skilled
labour employed in the direction of the establishment and
in the counter. The heads of the different departments
are filled by the partners in the house, of which, we have
been given to understand, there are eight, and that six
of these take an active part in the business. A general
council decides all matters of importance, but each partner
is responsible for some particular department. Thus one
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manages the publican department. The different houses
under his management might be looked upon as his colonies;
from them flows in the main part of the revenue of
the firm, and in return he assists them in their need. In
this office he is assisted by one of the younger partners.
The head of this department has also the important duty
of purchasing the supplies of hops required by the house a duty which requires, for its proper fulfilment, great judgment
and experience. Another of the partners presides
over the malt department; he looks over all the samples
of barley and malt, and to him the different rnaltsters employed by the firm
always appeal. The storehouse, also, is
under his eye, and his is the important duty of seeing that
the ale and porter manufactured is sent in good condition
to the customers. One of the younger partners acts as
his lieutenant in this arduous and responsible post. To
the principal partner is entrusted the financial department.
Through his hands pass the enormous sums of moneys paid and received, the total
amount of which may be guessed from the sum already mentioned as having been
expended in the purchase of malt and hops alone.
Another partner presides over the export trade a very
large and growing department, now that so many English
mouths accustomed to wholesome English ale and porter
are to be found in America and Australia. Another
manages the cooperage, and has control over the eighty
thousand barrels subject to the firm, which, if placed
together end to end, would extend forty-five miles in
length; in addition to which he manages the country
trade, which is very large in the manufacturing towns,
where the signs of the firm are almost as well known as in
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London. After the ministers, or council of six, come the
clerks; of these there are forty employed. Their stations
are various. The most important is a gentleman who
looks after the publicans; one is engineer, architect, and
surveyor; others are spread among the storehouses, the
brewery, and the cooperage; and some collect the moneys
of the firm, whilst the remainder act as clerks in the
counting-house.
Steam-power, as we have shown, is extensively used
throughout the brewery. There is one feature, however,
connected with the product of the steam, to which we wish
to call special attention, as it is a matter of the utmost
importance to the public in whatever light we look at it.
There are sixteen large furnace-chimneys in connection
with the brewery, which of old used to pour forth a cloud
of smoke from morning to night. The blacks arising
therefrom would have been nuisance enough in any neighbourhood, but in the centre of Spitalfields, the seat of the
hand-loom weaver, it was destructive in the highest degree;
the fine satins and expensive silks manufactured,
here were always more or less damaged whilst issuing from
the loom itself. It became a matter of importance, therefore,
to put a stop, as far as possible, to so serious an evil ;
and as early as the year 1848, long before the Smoke
Consuming Act was passed, the Messrs. Hanbury and Co.
made an experiment upon one of the furnaces with Jucke's
smoke-consuming apparatus, which entirely succeeded, and
they have since successively applied it to all the furnaces.
The apparatus is exceedingly simple, and never gets out of
order. The principle of action is to supply the fuel to the
bottom of the furnace; by so doing all the smoke has to [-223-]
pass through the fire instead of over and away from it, as
in the ordinary manner. The way this is accomplished is
very simple. An endless-jointed and rather open blanket-chain,
the width of the furnace, is made to revolve over
two rollers placed at either end of the fire. This chain
consequently forms the base or platform upon which the
coal rests. One end of this revolving platform extends a
couple of feet or so beyond the furnace-door, and on this
portion a quantity of screened or dust coal is always kept.
When a fresh supply of fuel is required, the engineer has
only to turn a handle, the chain works on a couple of feet,
and whilst the coal is insinuated under the clinkers at one
end, the refuse is worked out of the furnace at the other.
In order to test the power of this invention to consume
the smoke, we were taken up to the roof of the brewery,
which commands a view of the fourteen tall chimneys belonging
to it. Not a particle of opaque vapour could be
seen emerging from anyone of them; in fact, they looked
as idle as the "silly buckets on the deck," in the Ancient
Mariner. These smokeless shafts, however, were a fine
prospect, and as we gazed upon them, the atmosphere in
the future, like a dissolving process in the views at the
Polytechnic, became exquisitely clear, the newly-built
columns came out sharp against the sky, the clouds of soot
from St. Paul's dropped down like a black veil, and all the
city, in our mind's eye, stood before us at mid-day, as clear,
bright, and crisp, as Paris appears from the Arc de Triomphe.
Sooner or later this vision must be a reality; the
great factories within the limits of the city must consume
their own smoke according to law; and now that Dr.
Arnott has applied the same apparatus to the domestic
[-224-]
hearth, we may reasonably hope to see every grate consume
its own smoke. The best incentive to manufacturers
to apply the new apparatus is the fact that the saving in
the consumption and prime cost of the fuel used is thereby
considerable.
A still more interesting question to us, however, is that
of the "moral smoke," in connection with the people employed
in this brewery, and of the measures taken by the
firm to consume it. We are glad to find that in this great
brewery the partners have been also mindful of the condition
of their work-people. A library containing nearly
2,000 volumes has been provided. These books are lent
out to read, and however little of the look of the student
the burly drayman might have about him, we can assure
the reader that very extensive use has been made of this
lending-library. A short time since a reading-room was
added, but this has not turned out so successful. The
only time that the persons employed in the brewery could attend would of course be after the hours of labour, and it
is found that, either from the men being too tired to return
to the brewery, or from a disinclination to do so, the place
is but little used.
The proprietors have had more success with what appears
to us the most important institution of the brewery the
savings bank. We are informed that the labouring
men have already deposited a considerable sum in it; and
this sum is exclusive of the subscriptions to the benefit
club, and of the sum laid by in the same institution by
the clerks, which reaches a much larger amount.
The school a very large one built for the use of the
children of the workmen, some years ago, is not in the im-[-225-]mediate vicinity of the brewery, as the firm could not
obtain a convenient site. It contains a thousand children.
It is not exclusively nor even chiefly used by them, but by
the children of the neighbourhood in which it is situated.
The firm is, however, about to establish a. school for the
elder boys of the men, which is to be of a first-rate character. This mental training-ground is to be made subsidiary
to the interests of the firm, as well as of the children
themselves; that is, the lads who show most talent and
industry are to have the first offer of employment in the
concern. By this means merit will find its due reward,
and the brewery will be fed with that invaluable commodity
intelligent and assiduous labour.