REPORT OF M. TURREL. 333 
very imperfect apparatus, five per cent. of pure alcoho]. This alcohol 
is of very fine flavor ; and he considers it comparable to our excellent 
tafia ; furthermore, he has produced a wine quite similar in flavor to 
the cider of Normandy. S. Vilmorin obtains with the common cider 
mill, 50 per cent: of juice, an average density of 1050 to 1070, which he 
concentrates by evaporation. He adds about two hundred grammes 
of oak shaving to a hectolitre of juice; ebullition reduces the liquid 
to a half, which he finds completely purified by the precipitation of 
the albuminous matters which combine with the tannin of the shav- 
ings. The purification may be obtained with cherry shavings; and 
to the wine obtained by fermentation can be given, by using a little 
yeast, different flavors, by infusing in the liquid during fermentation — 
flowers of elder, hops, fir buds, or berries of the juniper. 
In continuing the evaporation of part of the juice, a caramel syrup 
is obtained, which is added to the juice after the first frothing or fer- 
mentation. A slightly saccharine liquid is thus obtained, which is 
made sparkling by putting it in bottles, before the fermentation is 
entirely completed. 
When the sap is intended for distillation, it is necessary, adds M. 
Vilmorin, that nearly the whole of it should be fermented with the 
presence of oak shavings. 1-20 only of the juice will be ample to expe- 
dite and regulate the fermentation, which one can determine, for the 
first time as needed, by the addition of a small quantity of yeast. 
M. de B. has made the juice of the sorgho ferment without previous 
working in his wine vats, by means of grape stems of his vintage. 
He has obtained, from the distilled juices, an alcohol of first quality, 
in which it is impossible to distinguish the slightest herbaceous flavor ; 
for he has sold his products, in the Marseilles exchange, at the current 
price of the ordinary alcohols. 
By adopting for all France, the result obtained at Verriéres by S. 
Vilmorin with the sorghos cultivated in his estate, we would have the 
following result : the sorgho yields a maximum of 50 per cent. of the 
weight of its stalks in saccharine juice ; the minimum production cal- 
culated from the yield at Verriéres, would be thirty thousand kilo- 
grammes of juice to the hectare ; we could extract from it twenty-one 
hectolitres of alcohol, worth three thousand seven hundred and eighty 
