open sound Air, in a large quantity, and where the Sun has free access; it
then comes near, if not quite as good as Rain or River-waters, as is that
of _Blew-pot_ Pond on the high Green at _Gaddesden_ in _Hertfordshire_ and
many others, which are often prefer'd for Brewing, even beyond many of the
soft Well-waters about them. But where it is in a small quantity, or full
of Fish (especially the sling Tench) or is so disturbed by Cattle as to
force up Mud and Filth; it is then the most foul and disagreeable of all
others: So is it likewise in long dry Seasons when our Pond-waters are so
low as obliges us to strain it thro' Sieves before we can use it, to take
out the small red Worms and other Corruptions, that our stagnant waters
are generally then too full of. The latest and best Doctors have so far
scrutinized into the prime Cause of our _British_ malady the Scurvy, as to
affirm its first rise is from our unwholesome stagnating waters, and
especially those that come off a clayey surface, as there are about
_Londonderry_ and _Amsterdam_, for that where the waters are worst, there
this Distemper is most common, so that in their Writings they have put it
out of all doubt, that most of our complicated symptoms that are rank'd
under this general Name, if they don't take their beginning from such
water, do own it to be their chief Cause.




CHAP. VI.


_Of Grinding_ Malts.


As trifling as this Article in Brewing may seem at first it very worthily