[Sca-cooks] Period gifts in jars

[Terry Decker]

> --- Sue Clemenger <mooncat at in-tch.com> wrote:
>
>>  Did
>> y'all know that they used to use gunpowder to test the proof? ;o)
>>
> Gunpowder?  Please, tell me more.  I'm intrigued.
>
> William de Grandfort

As I recall, you need 90 proof or better to burn hot enough to light off the 
gunpowder.  Or as Khlit the Cossack said of such things, "Bah!  In my day we 
poured corn liquor on the powder to make it burn hotter." (After he spat 
whiskey in the touch holes of a fort's guns to clear the way for an 
assault.)

Bear