254 Process for preventing Ropiness in Wines. 
form a calorific focus at yet a greater distance, light not being 
converted into heat until it is reflected. 
In my next I shall endeavour to support Leibnitz’s Theory of 
Refraction, and shall give some new experiments with the prism. 
Sir, I remain 
Your obedient servant, 
Cork, May 24, 1821. ' ‘J. Reape, M.D. 
LV. Process for preventing and correcting an Imperfection in 
Wines, known by the Name of Ropiness. By M., Herprrn*. 
Rorinzss of wines isa kind of spontaneous decomposition which 
gives them a consistence similar to that of oil. The wine at- 
tacked by ropiness becomes flat and insipid; it turns yellow when 
poured out, runs in a thread like oil, and loses its natural fluidity. 
{t froths with difficulty by agitation, and disagrees with the sto- 
mach. This alteration, which attacks wines during their insensi- 
ble fermentation, is the more injurious as the alcohol already 
formed is destroyed to enter into new combinations: ropy wine, 
therefore, submitted to distillation, gives but a small quantity 
of. brandy, which is of a bad quality, and which has a taste so 
much the more empyreumatic as the wine distilled is more mu- 
cilaginous. ; Sat 
It is remarked that white-wines seldom turn ropy while in 
cask, but that they do frequently when in bottle. 
The remedy for recovering ropy wine, consists in dissolving 
from six to twelve ounces of acidulous tartrite of potash (cream 
of tartar), and an equal quantity of coarse sugar, in a gallon of 
wine heated to boiling. ‘This mixture is to be poured warm into 
the ropy wine, the cask is to be stopped up and shaken for five 
or six minutes, and then put in its place with the bung turned 
downward. After resting for a day or two in that position, the 
cask is to be turned and the wine fined in the usual way; but in- 
stead of stirring it through the bung-hole, as commonly practised, 
the cask is to be shaken for a few minutes and put in its place 
with the bung turned up. In four or five days the wine will be 
clear, dry, limpid, and completely freed from ropiness ; but as it 
cannot safely remain upon the sediment, it must be drawn off, 
after which it will not be liable to become ropy again. If the 
ropy Wine is in bottles, they should be emptied into a cask, ta 
undergo the preceding operation. : 
4 
* From Bulletin de la Seciété d Encouragement. 
LVI. On 
