And in Colonial times at 8.5 percent, stronger than most beers. on 9/6/10 5:25 PM, Martin D. Zehr at [log in to unmask] wrote: > For the same reasons Gregg provides, cider was a more popular drink, especi= > ally the fermented variety, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries than= > it is today. -- Linwood Cottage, Sheffield This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector. -- Plato