246 GRATE CULTURE AND WINE-JMAiaNG. 



Thus, in remote antiquity, Aristfeus taught the method of ame- 

 liorating the must by an addition of honey. Others tried this by 

 adding different substances, salt, sea- water, ashes, chalk, gypsum, 

 raisins, and, later yet, of potassa, brandy, and water. Some of 

 these are still in use in our own days, especially the most natural 

 and useful of them — water and sugar. And these have gained 

 favor at this time in France, after such men as the honorable min- 

 ister and eminent chemist, Count de Chaptal, and the eminent nat- 

 uralist, Cadet de Vaux, and others, began to teach and warmly to 

 recommend those means to improve greatly even the most infe- 

 rior quality of must. 



Up to their time it was the general policy of the wine-dealers 

 acquainted with these "arfe" to keep them jealously concealed 

 from the great mass of the small producers, only transferring them 

 as a sort of valuable family secret to their own kindred, in order 

 not to be interfered with in their immense gains. The promul- 

 gation of the knowledge by the above-named savans checked this 

 system effectually, not, however, without first doing battle to the 

 combined fraternity of those privileged few, who ridiculed it, and 

 gave out to the world that it was all nonsense, and that Nature 

 alone could and would produce the true generous beverage. 



We propose to give here some extracts from the principal 

 works of some of these eminent men upon this subject. 



Frenchmen. 



Maupin. — This estimable chemist, in 1768, in his essay, The 

 Art of Increasing Wines hy TFafer, recommended to reduce by the 

 addition of water the musts of the South, which contained too 

 much sugar; by which process he said that he had always ob- 

 tained, not only a greater quantity of wine, but also that which 

 was richer in "spirit." He failed, however, to give instruction as 

 to the proper regulation of the quantity of water, or to extend it 

 to the treatment of sour musts. 



Lenoir {Traite de la Culture de la Vigne et de la Vinification, 

 1828) says : I believe it was Mr. Delaveau that had the courage, 

 notwithstanding the derision heaped upon him by the blockheads, 

 to recommend the method of adding water to the overcharged 

 must to make it more ready to ferment and produce more alcohol 

 in the wine. He also, to the same end, recommended to add wine 

 or beer yeast to such must. 



Add so much water as will be found necessary to reduce the 

 must to a density of ten degrees by Beaume's scale. In cold 

 weather the water has to be sufficiently warmed, in order to im- 



fart to the must the most favorable temperature for fermentation, 

 t has, indeed, even answered to mix equal parU; of water with 

 must very rich in sugar, and the wine produced thereby proved 

 superior to that made of like must not watered at all. 



The reason for not speaking of reducing the overcharge of acid 



