Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 26.djvu/692

674 to the injurious nature of the impurities of plastered wines, endeavors have been made to free them from these by a method called 'deplastering,' but the remedy proves worse than the defect." The samples analyzed by Carles contained barium salts, barium chloride having been used to remove the sulphuric acid. In some cases excess of the barium salt was found in the wine, and in others barium sulphate was held in suspension.

Closely following the abstract of this paper, in the "Journal of the Chemical Society, is another from the French "Journal of Pharmaceutical Chemistry," vol. v, pp. 581-583, to which I now refer, by the-way, for the instruction of claret-drinkers, who may not be aware of the fact that the phylloxera destroyed all the claret grapes in certain districts of France, without stopping the manufacture or diminishing the export of claret itself! In this paper, by J. Lefort, we are told, as a matter of course, that "owing to the ravages of the phylloxera among the vines, substitutes for grape-juice are being introduced for the manufacture of wines; of these, the author specially condemns the use of beet-root sugar, since, during its fermentation, besides ethyl, alcohol, and aldehyde, it yields propyl, butyl, and amyl alcohols, which have been shown by Dujardin and Audigé to act as poisons in very small quantities." In connection with this subject I may add that the French Government carefully protects its own citizens by rigid inspection and analysis of the wines offered for sale to French wine-drinkers; but does not feel bound to expend its funds and energies in hampering commerce by severe examination of the wines that are exported to "John Bull et son Île," especially as John Bull is known to have a robust constitution. Thus, vast quantities of brilliantly-colored liquid, flavored with orris-root, which would not be allowed to pass the barriers of Paris, but must go somewhere, is drunk in England at a cost of four times as much as the Frenchman pays for genuine grape-wine. The colored concoction being brighter, and skillfully cooked, and duly labeled to imitate the products of real or imaginary celebrated vineyards, is preferred by the English gourmet to anything that can be made from simple grape-juice.

I should add that a character somewhat similar to that of natural dryness is obtained by mixing with the grape-juice wine a secondary product, obtained by adding water to the marc—i. e., the residue of skins, etc., that remains after pressing out the must or juice; a minimum of sugar is dissolved in the water, and this liquor is fermented. The skins and seeds contain much tannic acid or astringent matter, and this roughness imposes upon many wine-drinkers, provided the price charged for the wine thus cheapened be sufficiently high. After this, according to Gardner (Churchill's "Technological Handbook," "The Brewer, Distiller, and Wine Manufacturer"), "the same marc is treated in a similar manner with a fresh quantity of sugar solution, and sometimes undergoes as many as three or four separate macerations, each