254 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



It is an important point with wine-makers to avoid disturb- 

 ing the process of fermentation. Between times, when the 

 wine is at rest, it should be racked off, and placed in a clean 

 cask. At the end of a year and a half, good, dry, still wine 

 has become clear ; but it continues to grow better with age for 

 about a score of years, at the expiration of which period it 

 has acquired a mellowness and delicacy of flavor, and an oili- 

 ness of consistency, which neither gain nor lose by longer 

 preservation. 



In making wine, much depends on the management of the 

 fermentation. The grapes should not be pressed until they 

 are between 55 and 70 warm, and it is very important that 

 the first fermentation should not be checked by cold, which 

 frequently interferes, whereas natural heat very seldom does. 



181. Kinds of Wine. California makes many kinds of 

 wines, the chief classes being the dry, the sweet, the still, and 

 the sparkling, the Mission, and the foreign. Dry wine is that 

 in which the sugar of the grape is all, or nearly all, converted 

 into alcohol. In other words, the process of fermentation has 

 been carried through to completion. Claret, Sauterne, and 

 the light wines generally, are dry, and they are preferred by 

 connoisseurs, because they can be drank in considerable quan- 

 tities without either cloying the palate or confusing the head, 

 and because it is easier for the practised taste to detect adul- 

 terations. 



The sweet wines are those which contain part of their sugar 

 unchanged ; and, usually, fermentation has been arrested in 

 them by either allowing the graphs to become over-ripe, and 

 thus extremely rich in sugar, or by mixing brandy with them. 

 The ordinary ports, sherries, and madeiras of commerce, are 

 sweet wines, or imitations of them ; though the Spaniards of 

 the Jerez district, and the Portuguese near Oporto, drink dry 

 port and sherry, whereas those wines designed for the English 

 market are fortified with distilled liquor. Sweet wines usually 

 have from fifteen to twenty-five per cent, of alcohol in them, 



