wilis composed of the corolla, with four or five petals, scarcely

Perceptible, inserted on the summit of the disc, turning inwards ~ “Me edge in estivation in a somewhat valvate manner, the apex

often inflexed. To the petals are opposed four or five stamens, with free filaments cohering slightly at the base, having bilocular anthers opening from within by two longitudinal clefts, and attached dorsally. From the centre of the flower rises a free

ovary, surrounded at the base by a glandular disc, which is surmounted by a simple stigma, sessile and flat at the summit. This ovary is superior, and two-celled, each cell enclosing two collateral anatropal ovules, ascending from the base of the chamber. Each of these ovules becomes a globular berry, as in Fig. 409, which contains, when it does not prove abortive, four seeds or pips. These seeds, the shells of which a very are horny, enclose erect in the small embryo, direct axis of a very

Fig. 408.—Flower of the Vine. abundant fleshy albumen.

Under the general name of wine is designated the juice of the . _ grape when it has been subjected to fermentation, and we need not trouble ourselves to express here how important the grape harvest becomes to many countries. In France nearly five millions of acres are planted with vines, and if these produce in average years two thousand millions of io ohSc vines of all qualities, it shows that the culture of eg ' the Vine is perfectly suited to the temperate climate of the country. We have already stated that the forests of Mongrelia and the

mountains of the Caucasus are the native country of the Vine; the actual limits of cultivation in Europe have been more exactly defined in the “ Atlas de Physique Végétale” of M. H. Tricholet, who devotes a map to the limits of vine culture on the globe. In this map a red line, drawn from Cape Finisterre along the coast of Spain, across France, leaving Paris a little to the north, across Germany, the northern shores of the Black Sea, to the Caucasus and Caspian Sea, forms the northern limits of cultivation for wine; the Mediterranean, the Sea of Marmora, and the southern shores of the Black Sea, being its southern limits. A bold dash of green colour, which covers the whole of the western hemisphere, from 30° south latitude to the parallel of New York sud the west coast of Africa, indicates the range of the wild grape; while a delicate yellow tint, extending over a great part of Arabia, Asia Minor, and south and east of the Caspian, as far as China and the seas of Japan, marks the range of country over which the grape is cultivated for its fruit only, either dried or in its green State. The Vine requires a temperate climate, but its prosperity depends, not upon the mean temperature of the country, so much as upon the heat and length of summer. The heat should be sufficiently intense to ripen the fruit; and this requires that it should endure far into the autumn in order to ripen the. gTapes, There are from twelve to fifteen species of the Vine, but the Varieties produced by cultivation and cross impregnation are mnumerable. Greater differences are the result of soil and situation;gentle sloping hills, well isolated, with a south and westerly aspect, upon which the sun’s rays rest the whole day, are the best localities; and the influence of temperature is such that it is quite usual to obtain upon the same hill grapes of the most oppo- Site qualities, according to the variable heights. As to the Mfluence which the composition of the soil exercises, it appears to be more a question of bouquet than of quality in the wine. short, excellent wines are produced from soils of the most °pposite quality. The best crus of Burgundy are the produce of an argillaceous chalky soil; those of Champagne proceed from a “oil eminently calcareous. The vines of the Hermitage ripen

their fruits upon the crumbling débris of granitic rocks; those of Chateauneuf upon a siliceous soil. An unctuous sandy soil produces the wines of Graves and Medoc; while a schistose soil produces the wines of Lamalgue, near Toulon.

It is very important to choose the suitable pasture on which to feed the Vine, which is essentially a coarse-feeding plant. Soils which are too energetic produce quantity at the expense of quality. Where the grape is high-flavoured, it alters the aroma of the wine. The nourishment most appropriate to the vine is without smell and of slow decomposition, such as woollen rags, clippings of horn, and such refuse. Its own ashes constitute an excellent manure, restoring to the vine the salts of potash which were drawn from it in the previous year’s growth.

The composition of the grape is sufficiently complex. It consists of the following substances, viz.: water, lignine, saccharine, pectine, tannin, albumen, the germs of fermentation, in azote, essential oils, glycerine, colouring matter (yellow, blue, and red, the first occurring only in white grapes), fatty matter, salts of lime and of potash—viz. pectin and tartrates—oxides of iron and silica. Amongst these various substances the saccharine matter, or glycose, which produces alcohol by its fermentation or chemical decomposition, plays the most important part in the act of converting the juice of the grape into wine.

It is only when the grape is thoroughly ripe that the vintage should take place,if it is desired to have wine’of good quality. Where the properties are enclosed, perfect ripening can be waited for; but in most vineyards of France the harvest is pushed on by the ban de vendange, which is fixed by the local authorities acting under a council of vine-dressers.

The various operations which follow the vintage are reduced to four. 1. Fullage of the grapes. 2. Fermentation of the must. 3. Decuivage. 4. Pressurage.:

Fullage is the art of dividing and crushing the fruit; exposNg the juice momentarily to the action of the air and bringing the fermenting principle into contact with the saccharine matters. Formerly the operation of crushing the grapes was performed by the vine-dresser stamping upon them with the feet; now the grapes are crushed at a price proportioned to the vintage by,

passing them between two cylinders, channeled, and turning in inverse directions. | When the grapes are crushed effectually, they are abandoned to fermentation. In proportion as fermentation advances, the temperature of the mass increases, so that it sometimes attains the temperature of 50° C. It originates much carbonic acid gas, which brings to the surface parts of the stem and husk of the grape, and forms a thick sort of covering to the liquid mass, which is called the chapeau. The fermentation, which is well developed on the second day’s Encuivage, is continued up to the eighth day, its state being indicated by the gas ceasing to be disengaged, and by the colour of the liquid, which takes a fine vinous tint, the alcohol, which is now present, having dissolved the colouring matter contained in the pellicles of the grape. ° When Decuivage is about to take place, the liquor is drawn off, by means of a tap at the bottom of the vat, into casks, which are filled only to the fourth or fifth of their capacity, and which are then left open, in order that fermentation may continue slowly and _ the disengagement of gas still proceed. _ The mass of the vintage remaining in the tun after the liquor 18 drawn off, is subjected to pressure. The liquor which flows - under this pressure, however, cannot be wine of equal quality. This is the process by which red champagne is produced. White wine can always be obtained from red grapes. To effect this, in place of leaving the must to ferment with its residuum of husk, the liquor is drawn off as it is pressed, and fermented in Separate tuns. As the colouring matter of the wine only exists _ WM the pellicle of the grape, we can readily conceive that, being *eparated at once from the must, little or no colour is communi-tated to the liquid. SS € wine preserved in the tuns, as we have said, ferments lowly by this second fermentary process, the liquid is clarified, - t foreign matter is deposited, and forms the lees, which accu- _ Mmulate at the bottom of the tun. In order that the wine may retain tts good quality, it becomes necessary to draw it off; that is, to _ Separate it from the lees. In the months of March and April thewine is thus drawn off. If it is not quite limpid, recourse

| shad to clarification, or Collage. This operationis intended

to make the wine pure and limpid, and divest it of the fermenting principle which is still held in suspension, and which might produce renewed fermentation. The fining for red wine is made of white of eggs, of blood, or of gelatine. The albumen or gelatine of these substances combining with the tannin dissolved in the wine, forms a precipitate, that is, a substance insoluble in the liquid, which is slowly deposited in the bottom of the tun, drawing with it all other foreign substances held in suspension in the liquor. The sparkling wines of Champagne are prepared by special processes which require more particular description. ‘The greater part of these wines are made from the red or purple grape, the juice of which is generally richer in saccharine than the white. A first pressure of the grape yields the liquor which produces the whitest wine. The residuum being subjected to further pressure, furnishes the juice which gives the rose-coloured wines. The must, white or rosy, is then put into great tuns, in which fermentation is established. After twenty-four hours the must or wort is drawn from the tun into another, which is filled and closed. This wine is drawn and fined three times, at intervals of a month, and in the month of April it is bottled. At. this time three to five per cent. of crystallised or candied sugar is added to the liquid. At the end of a few months this added saccharine produces fermentation in the bottle, which increases the richness of the wine in alcohol and carbonic acid gas. In consequence of the excess of gas thus evolved, the bottles ought to be well corked, and the corks strongly secured with iron wire. The sugar added in bottling tests the alcoholic strength of the liquor and rouses the fermenting material remaining unconsumed in the wine, and the carbonic gas evolved in the renewed process having no means of escape, mingles with the wine, and renders It effervescing.: The pressure of the carbonic acid has the effect of bursting about twenty or thirty per cent. of the number bottled; the consequence has been a special manufacture of bottles for the supplying bottles wines of Champagne, many of the manufacturers under a warrantry that they will support a pressure of fifteen atmospheres.

The bottles remain full, and are placed in horizontal beds, for six months without being disturbed. But during this period fermentation has produced in the bosom of the liquor a deposit which proves clearly enough that fermentation has been going on. It is necessary to remove this deposit, which would otherwise destroy the transparency of the liquid. This new operation, which is called disgorging (dégorgeage), is one of extreme delicacy. The operator shakes the bottle so as to detach the deposit from it, and replaces it gently in a vertical position, the mouth downwards. The deposit thus descends to the neck of the bottle; if it is rapidly uncorked in that position the pressure of the liquor expels the deposit. The great delicacy of this operation lies in the necessity of losing the least possible quantity of gas and wine. The Champagne cellarman performs the difficult operation with great address. The Liqueurs of the Vine are those which after fermentation ‘Preserve a great part of their saccharine. It is chiefly in the countries of the south of Europe—in Italy, Spain, and the south of France—that these wines are prepared. To obtain Tokay, for example, the proportion of saccharine is increased by leaving the most choice grapes to get thoroughly ripe, even to the extent of being slightly touched with frost; and even by placing them, after ing cut, upon frames to dry, in order that the water may : _ *Yaporate in part, thus increasing the saccharine richness of the must.' It is thus apparent that in vinification the chemical process is _ Rot confined to the conversion of sugar into alcohol. There are - ides the combinations between the various free acids and the alcohol, with the essential oils proper to the kind of grape which _ Produce what is called Jowguet in wines. Their aleoholic richness Se alsovery variable, as the following table of the natural strength :] of Wines will show:— ster Males. 04 20 per cent. of alcohol. Sherry, or Lachryma-Christo...) 17», i ee ne «— a Malaga and White Sauterne... 15 - ‘a crm dé Pies i Po eg Valney, Rhine Wine, and Fontignan 11 “i s iy ‘3 Pe oe

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