But those imitations are far from the degree of perfection of the Holland gin: they want that unity of taste, which is the result of a single creation; they are visibly compounds, more or less well combined, and not the result of a spontaneous production. To this capital defect, which makes those imitations so widely different from their original, is joined their high price, which prevents its general consumption. In fact, it is made at a considerable expense: the whiskey must be purchased, rectified and distilled over again with the berries. These expenses are increased by the waste of spirit occasioned by those reiterated distillations. This brings the price of this false gin to three times that of the whiskey: consequently the poorer sort of people, whose number is always considerable, are deprived of the benefits of a wholesome liquor, and restrained to whiskey, which is commonly not so. The methods used in Holland, have reduced gin to the lowest price; that of the juniper berries being there very trifling, and increasing but little the price of whiskey: still that small addition is almost reduced to nothing, as will be seen hereafter. The United States are, in some parts, almost covered with the tree called here _cedar_; which tree is no other than the juniper, and grows almost every where, and bears yearly a berry, which is in reality the juniper berry. Some Hollanders knew it at Boston, collected considerable quantities of it in Massachusetts, and shipping it to some of the eastern harbors, sold it as coming from Holland. I have seen some at Philadelphia ten years ago, at the house of a Hollander, who received it from Massachusetts in hogsheads of about ten hundred weight, and sold as the produce of his own country, what was really that of the United States. I collected myself a great quantity of those berries, at Norfolk, Va. by means of negroes, to whom I paid one dollar per bushel of 40 lbs. being 2-1/2 cts. per pound. Two years ago, it sold for 6 cents in Philadelphia, and bore the same price at Pittsburgh. There is a great deal of cedar in Kentucky, and consequently of berries. I have seen them at Blue Licks, and they abound near the Kentucky river. Although an incredible number of those trees is cut down daily, there is still a greater number standing, in the United States; and millions of bushels of berries are lost every year, while only skilful hands are wanted, to make them useful to mankind. The juniper berry has many medical properties: it is a delightful aromatic, and contains an oil essential, and a sweet extract, which by the fermentation yields a vinous liquor, made into a sort of wine in some countries; that is called wine for the poor: it strengthens the stomach, when debilitated by bad food or too hard labor.