[K] On this subject, Mr. J. D. Williams, the Editor of Sir William Blackstone’s Commentaries, has rendered no trifling service to society, by his petition, presented to the House of Commons, by the Marquess of Blandford, on June 17th, 1830; in which he prayed the appointment of fit and competent persons for the digestment and simplification of, or, in the emphatical language of Lord Bacon, for “the choice and tender business of reducing and harmonizing,” the hybrid and confused state of the law. As he justly said, “no useful and beneficial amendment or amelioration can reasonably be expected; but the Statute Book will still continue to be disgraced with enactments which will be at variance with common sense, the first principles of justice, and even nullify the intent and purport of the enactments themselves, while the concoction of laws is entrusted to others than persons endowed with a spirit of comprehensive knowledge, great enlightenment, enlarged and liberal understandings, and who are acquainted with the nature of the subjects on which they presume to legislate.” The instances which that gentleman adduced in his well intended petition of “the great and singular blunders” as to “erroneous conclusions in the first principles of science,” committed by some of our law-makers are really amusing—if any honest man can derive amusement from his country’s injury and degradation. PART II. _A Word or Two, by way of Introduction._ I have told thee, friend Bull, while discoursing of the little slips and sleights of hand in use among thy good and ancient friends, the wine and spirit dealer, the gin-shop keeper, the brewer, and the publican, that thou wouldst be satisfied that “Death was not only in the Bottle,” but that thou wouldst find that the complaint of the sons of the prophet, “There is Death in the Pot” ought not to have been confined to the narrow limits of Gilgal, but that it extends in all its operations to the illicit doings in thy own “dear native little island”—the “land of the _good_ and the _wise_.” I shall now proceed to unfold to thee this part of my duty, and then I apprehend that thou wilt lay aside thy usual scepticism and incredulity, and acknowledge that I have made out to thy satisfaction the truth of my horrific title “DEADLY ADULTERATION AND SLOW POISONING; OR, DISEASE AND DEATH IN THE POT AND THE BOTTLE.” I shall begin with the “_Staff of Life_.” SECTION I. _Bread and Flour._ Good bread is light, porous, and spongy; of a sweet nutty smell; and when pressed with the finger is tough and resists the pressure like sponge, recovering with a spring its original texture as soon as the finger is removed: if any fracture appears, it is a sign of adulteration. The more numerous and large the cells or little holes are in it, the more perfectly is the bread made, and the better adapted for digestion.