Ne’er tell me of liquors from Spain or from France, They may get in your heels and inspire you to dance, But the Ale of Old Burton if mellow and right Will get in your head and inspire you to fight. Your Claret and Rhenish and fine Calcavella Were never yet able to make a good fellow, But of stout Burton Ale, if you drink but enough, ’Twill make you all jolly and hearty and tough. Then let meagre Frenchmen still batten on Wine, They ne’er will digest a good English Sirloin, Parbleu they may caper and Vapour along, But right Burton can make us both valiant and strong. Come here then ye Mortals who’re prone to despair From frowns of Dame Fortune or frowns of the fair, Whate’er your disorder, three nips will prevail, And the best Panacea you’ll find, Burton Ale. Then Molly approach with your Peacock and Cann— Not Juno herself brought more blessings to Man— With nip after nip, all my sorrows beguile, And my Fortune and Mistress shall presently smile. Old strong beer is sometimes known by the name of Stingo, and this appellation seems, for a couple of hundred years at least, to have been specially applied to Yorkshire Ale. The estimation in which this liquor was held at the end of the eighteenth century, and the wonders it was deemed capable of bringing about, may be learned from a perusal of _The Praise of Yorkshire Ale_, an old poem, extracts from which may be found in the chapter devoted to Ballads. We have been given to understand that the brewers of Yorkshire Stingo have not forgotten their ancient skill. Our old friend Taylor mentions a goodly number of places where especially good ale was brewed in his day. “I should be voluminous,” he says, “if I should insist upon all pertinent and impertinent passages {162} in the Behalfe of _Ale_, as also of the retentive fame that _Yorke_, _Chester_, _Hull_, _Nottingham_, _Darby_, _Gravesende_, with a Toaste, and other Countries still enjoy, by making this untainted liquor in the primitive way, and how _Windsor_ doth more glory in that composition than all the rest of her speculative pleasures. . . . . Also there is a Towne neere _Margate in Kent_ (in the Isle of Thanet) called _Northdowne_, which Towne hath ingrost much Fame, Wealth, and Reputation from the prevalent potencie of their attractive _Ale_.”