Chap. 10.] 



SALTED WINES. 217 



general not attended with good results. The protagion 41 is 

 quite gone out of date, a wine which the school of Asclepiades 

 has reckoned as next in merit to those of Italy. The physician 

 Apollodorus, in the work which he wrote recommending King 

 Ptolemy what wines in particular to drink— for in his time 

 the wines of Italy were not generally known— has spoken in 

 high terms of that of Naspercene in Pontus, next to which he 

 places the Oretic, 42 and then the (Eneatian, 43 the Leucadian, 44 

 the Ambraciotic, 45 and the Peparethian, 46 to which last he gives 

 the preference over all the rest, though he states that it en- 

 joyed an inferior reputation, from the fact of its not being 

 considered fit for drinking until it had been kept six years. 



CHAP. 10. (8.) — SEVEN KINDS OF SALTED WINES. 



Thus far we have treated of wines, the goodness of which is 

 due to the country of their growth. In Greece the wine that 

 is known by the name of " bion," and which is administered 

 for its curative qualities in several maladies (as we shall have 

 occasion to remark when we come to speak on the subject of 

 Medicine 47 ), has been justly held in the very highest esteem. 

 This wine is made in the following manner : the grapes are 

 plucked before they are quite ripe, and then dried in a hot 

 sun : for three days they are turned three times a day, and on 

 the fourth day they are pressed, after which the juice is put 

 in casks, 48 and left to acquire age in the heat of the sun. 49 



The people of Cos mix sea- water in large quantities with 

 their wines, an invention which they first learned from a slave, 

 who adopted this method of supplying the deficiency that had 

 been caused by his thievish propensities. When this is mixed 

 with white must, the mixture receives the name of "leu- 



41 From its Greek name, it would seem to mean " of first quality." 



« So called from a place in Eubcea, the modern Negropont. See. B. iv. 

 c. 20. Negropont produces good wines at the present day. 



43 The locality is unknown. 



« From Leucadia, or Leucate ; see B. iv. c. 2 ; the vine was very abun- 

 dant there. 



45 From Ambracia. See B. iv. c 2. 



« From the island of Peparethus. See. B. iv. c. 23, where he says that 

 from its abundance of vines it was called ivoivog, or " Evenus." 



47 B. xxiii. c. 1, and c. 26. 48 " Cadis." 



49 Fee remarks that this method is still adopted in making several of 

 the liqueurs. 



