lo Aug., 1909.] Sherry : Its Making and Rearing. 



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soon as the grapes have once been crushed. Sherry in its youth is a light 

 delicate wine, totally different to the finished article. The greatest fault 

 in a young wine is coarseness, and one which for high-class sherries must 

 be avoided at any cost ; a wine which has any tendency towards coarseness 

 is said to be Basto, and never finds its way into the l^etter class wines. 

 It is, in fact, usually sent to the still. Distillation is the fate of all 

 inferior wines, the so-called " Cogn:;c Jerezano " enjoying great popularity 

 and meeting with a readv sale throughout Spain. The greatest care is 

 taken to avoid coarseness, and one of the main means to this end is the 

 rapid separation of the juice from the marc. So' much is this so, that 

 in former days it was customarv to separate the grapes from the stalks 

 over wide-meshed riddles before crushing and pressing. This, however, 

 is not so generallv prartised nowadays. 



INTERIOR OF PORTION OF l.(-l)LG . 



UU ./ \1 ' /, b\ \^ T WD LO 



The crushed grapes receive verv little pressing, in order to produce 

 the first qua lit v wine. Our photograph gives a view of some of the 

 lagares or wine presses at the Obregon vineyard. The most striking 

 feature of these is the lightness of the central screw, which is quite 

 mcapable of applying powerful pressure. 



The making of the wine is practicallv as follows : — Enough grapes are 

 emptied on to each lagar to vield i butt (108 gals.) of juice. These are 

 crushed bv being trampled on by men wearing hea\y shoes of a special 

 make. The juice flowing from this crushing is carefully strained before 

 being filled into the butt. During crushing the grapes are dusted over 

 with a certain quantity of " yeso, '' which is Spanish for gvpsum or 

 plaster (sulphate of lime), the addition of which is one of the important 

 features in the making of this wine and one which will be dealt with 

 in detail presently. 



When thoroughly crushed, the grapes are heaped round the central 

 screw and pressure is applied. In lieu of the cage of our presses, the 

 heap is kept in shape bv m.eans of a long strip of esparto matting held 



