———— 375. VINEGAR. Vinegar is used chiefly as a sauce, and to preserve vegetable substances; but it is employed externally when an over dose of strong wine, spirit, opium, or other narcotic poison has been taken. A false strength is given to it by adding oil of vitriol, or some acrid vegetable, as pellitory of Spain, capsicum, &c. It is rendered colourless by adding fresh burned bone black, 6 ounces to a gallon, and letting it stand for two or three days to clear. 376. TO MAKE VINEGAR. Mix cider and honey, in the proportion of 1 lb. of honey to a gallon of cider, and let it stand in a vessel for some months, and vinegar will be produced so powerful, that water must be mixed with it for common use. 377. _Another Method._ Scheele, a celebrated chymist, has recommended the following recipe: Take 6 spoonsful of good alcohol; to this, add 3 pints of milk, and put the mixture into vessels to be corked close. Vent must be given from time to time to the gas of fermentation. In the course of a month, this will produce very good vinegar. 378. _Another._ Put into a barrel, of sufficient dimensions, a mixture composed of 41 wine pints of water, about 8 pints of whiskey, (_l’eau de vin de grain_) about 2 wine pints of yeast, and 2 pounds of charcoal, and place it in a proper situation for fermentation. At the end of four months a very good vinegar will be formed, as clear and as white as water. 379. COMMON VINEGAR. This is made from weak malt liquor, brewed for the purpose; its various strength is, in England, denoted by numbers, from 18 to 24. 380. _Another._ To every gallon of water put 1 lb. of coarse Lisbon sugar; let the mixture be boiled, and skimmed as long as any scum arises. Then let it be poured into proper vessels; and when it is as cool as beer, when worked, let a toast, rubbed over with yeast, be put to it. Let it work about 24 hours, and then put it into an iron-hooped cask, fixed either near a constant fire, or where the summer sun shines the greater part of the day; in this situation it should not be closely stopped up; but a tile, or something similar, should be laid on the bung-hole, to keep out the dust and insects. At the end of about three months (sometimes less) it will be clear and fit for use, and may be bottled off. The longer it is kept, after it is bottled, the better it will be. If the vessel containing the liquor is to be exposed to the sun’s heat, the best time to begin making it is in the month of April. 381. WINE VINEGAR.