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|. REPORT OF THE’ CHEMIST.» 
-* apple-growing, and the cider press is an indispensable adjunct to a 
_ large orchard: Within the last ten years the manufacture of cider 
has been greatly aided by improvements, both in the machinery for 
- -erushing the fruit and in the presses for extracting the juice, but it 
/ is doubtful if the methods of treatment of the juice after extraction 
shave undergone a corresponding development. The methods of fer- 
_, mentation-and preserving—operations that areso carefully performed - 
-..in the manufacture of other fermented liquors—are exceedingly 
a _ erude, as Icantestify from personal experience. The juice, whether. 
4 containing a relatively large percentage of sugar or not, is drawn 
 . into barrels and left to itself, probably exposed to a hot sun and 
E to all the changes of temperature incident to the autumn season; 
and when the season is over or the cider is in danger of freezing, it 
~ is transferred to the cellar in the same barrels in which it was 
5 
_ perhaps of the’ cider into vinegar, is a very important branch of 
_ filtering or racking; and when any attempt at improving its keeping ~ 
conducting the process as to produce a liquor which can properly be 
’ -ealled the ‘‘wine of apples.’ 
— methods so palatable a drink is produced, a fact which only shows 
what might be done if a little care and scientific knowledge were 
_. applied to the treatment of the juice. There isa great difference 
_. between the practice here and in other countries in regard to the 
_ . treatment of the juice. Here the greater part of the cider produced 
is treated as indicated above, and is sold to the consumer in the fall 
-. or winter of the same year it is produced, without any treatment ° 
whatever, except perhaps the additién of a dose of mustard seeds 
| or sulphite of lime or salicylic acid, to arrest or retard the fermen- 
) tation. This addition serves only to stop the fermentation for a 
-. .while, probably through the winter, and in the spring whatever has 
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- not been consumed has to be thrown away or turned into vinegar. ' 
In England and France the juice is treated according to the sweet- 
ness of the apples from which it is made, very sweet juice requiring 
a low temperature for its fermentation, in order that the operation 
shall not be too rapid. The juice is run into barrels or large vats, 
which are kept in a barn or cellar where the temperature is more or 
less constant, and the fermentation allowed to go on until a ‘‘chapean” 
or head of scum forms on top, containing many of the impurities of 
the juice. The clear liquid is then “racked off” from between the 
impurities which have risen to the top and those that have fallen to 
the bottom. The casks into which it is received are scrupulously 
‘clean and are filled nearly full and transferred to a cooler cellar, 
where a second slow fermentation takes place. The racking-off pro- 
cess may be repeated if necessary, or the juice may be filtered from 
the first fermentation. Cider fermented and properly racked in this 
way will keep indefinitely at a low temperature, especially if bottled. 
}or bottling, it generally undergoes the operation called ‘‘ fining,” 
py the addition of isinglass, which removes most of the albuminous 
., constituents which are so inimical to its proper preservation. Cider. 
~ made-in this way will be much richer in alcohol and contain much 
less acetic acid than when its first fermentation is allowed to take 
place at a high temperature and in a rapid, tumultuous manner. It 
-. 1sa true apple wine ard will keep indefinitely. The cider of Devon- 
~ shire has been kept twenty or thirty years. 
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