Evidently in those days they had some crude sort of ideas on the subject of Cider Cup. {185} CHAPTER XVII CORDIALS AND LIQUEURS A chat about cherry brandy — Cherry gin — And cherry whisky — Sloe gin — Highland cordial — What King Charles II. swallowed — Poor Charles! — Ginger brandy — Orange-flower brandy — Employment of carraway seeds — The school treat — Use and abuse of aniseed — Do not drink quince whisky — Try orange brandy instead — A hell-broth — Curaçoa — Cassis — Chartreuse — The monks as benefactors — Some quaint tavern “refreshers” — Kirschenwasser — Noyeau — Parfait amour — Maraschino — A valuable ginger cordial. Let us commence with that grand old British eye-opener, _Cherry Brandy._ There are more ways than one of making this. Here is an old recipe. Take six dozen pounds of cherries, half red and half black, and mash or squeeze them with your hands to pieces, and put to them three gallons of brandy, and let them stand steeping twenty-four hours. Then put the mash’d cherries and liquor a little at a time into a canvas bag, and press it as long as any juice will run; sweeten it to your taste, and put it into a vessel fit for it, and let it stand a {186} month, and bottle it out; put a lump of loaf-sugar into every bottle. Another way, and a nicer; the idea of squeezing cherries to pieces with the human hands savouring of barbarism—and fingers. Take Black Geans or Black Morellos—but remember that the former are sweet, the latter acid and bitter, and there will be a great difference in the results. They must not be over-ripe. Take off the stalks, and if you choose prick them with a pin. Fill a bottle with them three-quarters, pour in brandy to the neck, and cork it up. It will be ready in a month. It will be noticed that no mention of sugar is made in the above. The necessary quantity would naturally vary, according to the description of cherry employed. Yet another—my way. This can either be made from Black Gean cherries, or Morellos, but the latter are better for the purpose. Every pound of cherries will require one quarter of a pound of white sugar and one pint of the best brandy. The cherries, with the sugar well-mixed with them, should be placed in wide-mouthed bottles, filled up with brandy; and if the fruit be previously pricked, the mixture will be ready in a month. But a better blend is procured if the cherries are untouched, and this principle holds good with all fruit treated in this way, and left corked for at least three months. It should be borne in mind that these cordials are far better when home-made—provided always {187} the best materials be used. The cherry brandy, sloe gin, etc. etc., which is bought is not always made with ’65 cognac. Remember how many people have to make some sort of profit out of what can be purchased over the counter. One more way.