One hundred years ago
The Times reports a Japanese discovery which may prove of great commercial importance. Yokichi Takamine, former- ly a student in Glasgow, has succeeded in producing from the roots of the Eurotium Oryzae, crystals of diastaste, the chemical substance sought by the usual processes of malting. Takamine's crystals, mixed with crude wheat-bran in equal proportions, "if added in the pro- portion of 10 per cent to the grain mashed, will effect a more perfect con- version than the use of 10 per cent of the best malt." In other words, the pro- duction of good beer and good spirits will have been cheapened and made more certain by the intelligence of a Japanese savant. That is capital news for all European Chancellors of the Exchequer, who will, let us hope, snap up half the saving effected in breweries and distilleries. The story, which appears in extenso in the Times of
i Thursday, p. 6, is a notable incident n
the most marvellous phenomenon of our time, the sudden uplifting of the cloud from the intellect of an Asiatic people. If we could only believe that moral improvement would keep Pace with intellectual, we should hail a neW vivifying force born into the world under our eyes.
The Spectator 15 December 1894
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