Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 45.djvu/775

Rh end of the rows, and there gathered two or three times a day and drawn to the packing house. The fruit that is not packed in boxes for market is stored in crates or on trays and, by proper ventilation and temperature it can be kept fresh and fair for several months. This gives the grower a long range of season, and choice table grapes are supplied from October till the following March or April.

This grape-picking time is a kind of long and pleasant picnic—all the more pleasant for being a busy one. The men and women look forward to it from year to year as a chance to earn money to carry them through the winter, while the young people regard the season as one of recreation and enjoyment. The most expert pickers are the women and girls. They come from the neighboring farms and country villages. The usual rate of wages is one dollar per day without "board," or three dollars per week with board.

The Lake Keuka grape crop is sent to market in small baskets. Last year (1893) the number of cars shipped from the district was not less than 2,200. As each car holds from 2,500 to 2,700 baskets, the reader can form some correct idea of the quantity of grapes produced annually in this one district. The bulk of the crop is sent to the Eastern cities—New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. The growers send table-grapes as far west as Omaha and Denver, and last season several carloads were shipped to the Northwest, and even to Manitoba.

At the present time the wine cellars take a very small per centage of the total crop. It is estimated that the twelve wineries in the Keuka Lake district use from 5,000 to 6,000 tons of grapes during the season. There is now an overproduction of grapes for table purposes. The growers look to the growing wants of the wine cellars to take their surplus crop. With the increasing demand for American wines, especially for champagne and delicate table wines, the time should be not far distant when the output of the cellars will be ten times as great as it is to-day.

Of course, the reader will be interested in learning how the pure, sweet juice of the grape is converted into lively, sparkling champagne. There is more or less of a veil of secrecy thrown around the ways and methods of the champagne-maker; for he is an artist and does not wish to disclose the mysteries of his art. What follows concerning the various processes through which the wine goes in its successive stages is the result of a visit made last autumn to the largest establishment of its kind in the United States.

The building of A. B. & Co. is on the shore of the lake, and, being constructed of huge blocks of quarried stone, looks like a mediæval castle. The outside gives one little notion of the size and capacity of the establishment. There are fourteen separate