BRANDY FROM SAWDUST.

Southland Times, Issue 1642, 1 October 1872, Page 5

BRANDY FROM SAWDUST.

* Assuming for argument that alcohol was invented by the devil for the destruction of the human family, it must be confessed that he does not lack for materials from which to produce the diabolical compound. The entire range of vegetable products has been made to yield intoxicating beverages • and among the most religious and highlycultivated nations, as well as those in the lower scale of humanity, the art of making something to get drunk on has always been a success. In the current monthly report of the Commissioner of Agriculture, it is announced tbat there is an immense waste of material in our sawmills, where the sawdust is thrown away, and that it is possible to produce from tbis dust a good article of brandy. It is suggested that the sawdust of pine and fir timber be mixed, and that a compound be prepared composed of 9 parts moist sawdust, 33.7 parts of water, .7 of oue part of hydro-chloric acid, making 43.7 parts altogether. These are to be boiled under steam pressure 11 hours, when it will be found that 19 per cent, of the mass will be grape sugar. The acid is to be neutralised with lime, and the mash supplied with yeast. After 96 hours' fermentation a distillation of the mash will produce 61 quarts of brandy of 50 per cent, strength, and free of any smell of turpentine. It is claimed that in all probability many other woods than pine and fir will prove even better adapted to tbe production of brandy. Here is an opening for a new and almost unlimited increase in the manufacture of brandy. In the immense lumber districts of the United States, the sawdust is now practically lost. But if it, by the simple application of water, and seemingly less auxiliaries than are required for grain distillation, can be made to produce good brandy, the dust will become as valuable as the lumber. Brandy distilleries will spring up in the neighborhood of all the sawmills, and the pine forests will have a new value given to them. The Commissioner of Agriculture publishes this statement as of an ascertained fact, and, if it be true, there is no reason why the manufacture may not commence at once. — Chicago Tribune.