ple of inches long. The diastase in the germinating seeds has the
same chemical effect as malt--the starch is changed to sugar.

The sprouted corn is then dried and ground into meal. This sweet meal is
then made into a mush with boiling water, and is let stand two or three
days. The "sweet mash" thus made is then broken up, and a little rye
malt, similarly prepared in the meantime, is added to it, if rye is
procurable. Fermentation begins at once. In large distilleries, yeast is
added to hasten fermentation, and the mash can then be used in three or
four days; the blockader, however, having no yeast, must let his mash stand
for eight or ten days, keeping it all that time at a proper temperature
for fermentation. This requires not only constant attention, but some
skill as well, for there is no thermometer nor saccharometer in our
mountain still-house. When done, the sugar of what is now "sour mash"
has been converted into carbonic acid and alcohol. The resulting liquid
is technically called the "wash," but blockaders call it "beer." It is
intoxicating, of course, but "sour enough to make a pig squeal."

This beer is then placed in the still, a vessel with a closed head,
connected with a spiral tube, the worm. The latter is surrounded by a
closed jacket through which cold water is constantly passing. A wood
fire is built in the rude furnace under the still; the spirit rises in
vapor, along with more or less steam; these vapors are condensed in the
cold worm and trickle down into the receiver. The product of this first
distillation (the "low wines" of the trade, the "singlings" of the
blockader) is a weak and impure liquid, which must be redistilled at a
lower temperature to rid it of water and rank oils.

In moonshiners' parlance, the liquor of second distillation is called
the "doublings." It is in watching and testing the doublings that an
accomplished blockader shows his skill, for if distillation be not
carried far enough, the resulting spirits will be rank, though weak, and
if carried too far, nothing but pure alcohol will result. Regular
distillers are assisted at this stage by scientific instruments by which
the "proof" is tested; but the maker of "mountain dew" has no other
instrument than a small vial, and his testing is done entirely by the
"bead" of the liquor, the little iridescent bubbles that rise when the
vial is tilted. When a mountain man is shown any brand of whiskey,
whether a regular distillery produ