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Darwin Correspondence Project

From H. B. Taylor   18 April 1881

1. Hyde Park Gardens. W.

April 18—81

My dear Sir,

My daughter is very much obliged to you for replying so soon to my letter about her “ginger-beer plant” and has given me the accompanying seed of it to send to you.1 She will be very glad if it should prove to be anything new to you, though this she thinks impossible! and in any case we shall all be glad to know what it is.

The water, ginger & sugar will not in twenty-four hours ferment in the same temperature that they will if the plant or seed is added, but this you will probably try for yourself. I enclose the directions—as my daughter dictates—for “feeding” the plant. & remain, | yours faithfully | Helen B. Taylor

C. Darwin Esq. F.R.S.

I enclose our Country address as we are leaving London tomorrow for the Season.2

H.B.T.—

[Enclosure]

“Ginger Beer Plant”

Put the Seed in a wide mouthed glass bottle—a pint bottle will do at first—and pour over it, half a pint of filtered spring water. Add to it, two, three or four pieces of unbleached bruised Ginger & two or three lumps of sugar. Put a piece of muslin over the top of the bottle & place it where the temperature is about 60 deg. In 24 hours pour off the liquor & add fresh water. Every alternate day a lump or two of sugar should be added but the Ginger need not be renewed more than once a week when the old Ginger should be taken out & the seed be carefully washed and strained back into the bottle. As the seed increases in bulk, more water, ginger & sugar will be required.

The beverage, which is very wholesome should be put daily into a corked bottle & be drunk within a few hours of its being taken from the plant.

Oct 18—81.3

Footnotes

Taylor’s earlier letter and CD’s reply have not been found. Taylor’s daughters were Mabel Mary and Beatrice Katherine Taylor. The ginger beer plant, a recent development, was a culture of yeasts and bacteria (OED). It consists of small clumps or grains, which, when added to ginger root (Zingiber officinale), sugar, and water, initiates fermentation in the production of ginger beer. For a scientific study of its constituents, see Ward 1892. In the process, the ginger beer plant grows. It can be divided and reused indefinitely if regularly fed with sugar and ginger. The ‘seed’ sent to CD was probably part of the plant belonging to Helen Taylor’s daughter.
The Taylors lived at Hyde Park Gate, London, and Aston Rowant, Oxfordshire. The height of the London social season was April to July; although from the 1880s the season had began to lose some of its exclusivity, it was primarily for the aristocracy and landed gentry (Ellenberger 1990). The Taylors’ background was mercantile.
Taylor probably wrote 18 October instead of 18 April in error.

Bibliography

Ellenberger, Nancy W. 1990. The transformation of London ‘Society’ at the end of Victoria’s reign: evidence from the court presentation records. Albion 22: 633–53.

Ward, Harry Marshall. 1892. The ginger-beer plant, and the organisms composing it: a contribution to the study of fermentation-yeasts and bacteria. [Read 21 January 1892.] Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 183: 125–97.

Summary

Sends "Ginger Beer Plant", a seed that assists the fermentation of ginger beer. [Also enclosed are instructions for making ginger beer dated, presumably erroneously, 18 Oct 1881.]

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-13126
From
Sara Helen Biggs (Helen) (Biggs) Taylor
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
London, Hyde Park Gardens, 1
Source of text
DAR 178: 54
Physical description
ALS 3pp, encl 2pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 13126,” accessed on 8 May 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-13126.xml

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