Some people never can leave even bad-enough alone.

So man, with an ingenuity which might have been much better used, sought a way of getting a liquor which would contain more alcohol than nature, unaided, could be made to brew in it.

A little experimenting showed that the alcohol in fermenting juices was lighter than water; so that by gently heating the fermenting mass, the alcohol would evaporate and pass off as vapor, with a little of the steam from the water.

Then, by catching this vapor in a closed vessel and pouring cold water over the outside of the vessel, it could be condensed again in the form of a clear, brownish fluid of burning taste, containing nearly fifty per cent of alcohol, instead of the original five or six.
This evaporated or distilled mixture of alcohol and water, if made from a mash of corn, wheat, rye, or potatoes, is called whiskey; if from fruit-juice, brandy.

A similar liquor, made out of fermented rice, is known as _arrack_ in India, or _sake_ in Japan; and the liquor made from fermented molasses is called rum.
Alcohol not a True Food, but a Drug.