spruce beer

A fermented liquor made from the leaves and small branches of the spruce-fir, or from the e ence of spruce, boiled with sugar or mola es, and fermented with yeast. It is useful as an anti-scorbutic. spruce-fir, s. Bot.: A popular name for many species of the genus Abies (q. v.), spec if. Abies excels a , a fine evergreen which sometimes reaches a height of 150 feet, with a straight, though not very thick trunk, and a regular pyramidal form. Leaves scattered equally round the twigs; four-cornered, mucronate, dull green; cones cylindrical, pendulous, with blunt, sinuate, slightly toothed scales. It is a native of the north of Germany and Norway, whence it is often called the Norway spruce. It is commonly planted in southern Europe, and af. fords an excellent shelter for game. Its timber is the white deal of com Spruce-fr. merce. It is not so durable as the Scotch pine, but is prized for masts, spars, scaffolding poles, . In Norway it takes seventy or eighty years to arrive at maturity. By incision it yields a resin whence tur pentine and Burgundy pitch are manufactured The White Spruce-fir ( A. alba ) has the leaves somewhat glaucous, rather pungent; the cones narrow. sprûçe, v. t. & i. [SPRUCE, a.] A. Trans.: To trim or dre in a spruce manner; to dre up; to prink. IMG:content-0116.jpg:[blocks in formation] More: Song of the Soul, I. ii. 39. B. In trans.: To dre one's self with affected neatne . To spruce up : To dre sprucely or trimly. "Salmacis would not be seen of Hermaphroditus, till she had spruced up herself first. " - Burton : Anat . of Melancholy, p. 335. sprûçe-lý, adv. [Eng.spruce; -ly.] In a spruce manner; with extreme or affected neatne . "Beware of men who are too sprucely dre ed." Congreve: Ovid Imitated.