AND WINE MAKING. x!87 



be one per cent, of alcohol in fermented and clarified 

 wine. 



Here again it is absolutely necessary that you should 

 know the material from which you make wine. The 

 Ohasselas varieties, for instance, contain but about three 

 pro mille acid, when the must indicates twenty-five 

 on Balling's scale, and will make a livelier wine when 

 taken if they show but twenty-two or twenty-three, than 

 if allowed to go up to twenty-five, or even higher. The 

 Riesslings, Sauvignon Vert, etc. , may be allowed to ripen 

 to twenty-five, as they contain more acid, although they 

 will also make a good wine if taken at twenty-two or 

 twenty-three. None of our light wines ought to show 

 higher than twenty-five, except perhaps the Zinfandel, 

 which contains more acid than any other Vinif era I know. 

 It must be very ripe to come up to twenty-five, and then 

 contains four and a half to five pro mille acid. When in 

 that stage, many of its berries are already shrivelled, as 

 it ripens unevenly; as it colors early, many wine-mak- 

 ers are led into the beliaf that it is ripe enough, and 

 gather it, when it should really hang a week longer. If 

 well ripened, on good soils, it makes a very fine claret, 

 but it is so universally grown and planted in all locations, 

 and often handled so ignorantly, that we find a great deal 

 more poor than good Zinfandel. But can we wonder at 

 this, when a paper which claims to be the leading organ 

 of the grape growers, advocates ignorance in its columns, 

 says that chemistry and science have nothing to do with 

 wine making, and do more harm than good ? 



It is this ignorance among the great mass of our wine- 

 makers that has been the cause, to a great extent, of so 

 much poor and sour wine. The idea prevailed that the 

 ripest grapes made the best wine, and few were aware of 

 the fact that there is a limit, a time when each variety 

 should be taken, when the sugar and acid are in the 

 proper proportion, and that at this period fermentation 



