408 



Journal of Agriculture, Victoria. [10 July, 1916. 



Port. Though the wine is distinctly sweet when first tasted, it leaves 

 a dry and absolutely clean impression on the palate, and in this it 

 differs radically from wines of Port type, which have as yet been pro- 

 duced in Australia. There seems good reason to believe that the 

 peculiar acidity or roughness attributed to the Alvarelhao grape by 

 most Portuguese writers is mainly responsible for this characteristic 

 of this world-famed wine. 



Second — That in order to extract the full measure of quality froir. 

 Alvarelhao grapes, the feitoria (literally factory) method of wine making 

 must be applied to it. This has been fully described in this Journal 

 (March, 1908, p. 185). In brief, it consists in fermentation on the 

 skins in shallow vats or lagares made of granite slabs; repeated 

 tramplings by gangs of men with bare feet being given at intervals of 



Fig. 4. — The ' ' Feitoria ' ' method of Port wine making. Trampling 

 the grapes in shallow granite vats or ' ' lagares ' ' in the Alto 

 Douro district, Portugal. 



Reproduced from " Facts about Port and Madeira," by Henry Vizotelly. 



from six to twelve hours during the whole course of fermentation. The 

 wine remains on the skins usually from three to four days. Sometimes 

 the stalks are wholly or partly removed, sometimes they are not removed 

 at all. Without this repeated stirring the acidity and bitterness con- 

 tained in the skins of the Alvarelhao grapes, so largely responsible for 

 the leading characteristic of true Port, will not be properly extracted 

 and communicated to the wine. (See Fig. 4.) 



Is tramping with the feet really neceesary ? It would appear not. 

 Duarte de Oliviera, in a quite recent work^ on wine making, holds 

 that the time-honoured feitoria method is merely a survival of ages 

 past, and that it would be cleaner and better in every way to substitute 

 repeated ramming and agitation with wooden rammers for tra,mpling 

 with the human foot. 



- Vinificdcdo. liy Pedro Bravo and Duarte de Oliviera. 



(To he eov tinned.) 



