NINTH ANNUAL MEETING. 71 



aroma or bouquet. California wines resemble French wines 

 the most. 



New England, and more especially Connecticut, is well 

 adapted for the perfect fermentation of the grape juice, the 

 different wines with 'proper and unceasing care, attain the 

 high qualities of European wines, as for instance, claret of 

 1895, or Delaware, also of 1895 vintage, rank as high as 

 imported, as several instances will prove. 



In 1898 a box of sixteen bottles was shipped to France 

 and was sampled by connoisseurs, people in the wine busi- 

 ness who knew what they were about. They mistook our 

 native wines for California, and even some 1893 and 1894 

 clarets were found as good as some Bordeaux clarets. In a 

 restaurant of a Connecticut city, 1895 claret, in sampling, 

 was also found better than imported wine. 



The only trouble, if we may call it trouble, is the 

 acidity, which can easily be overcome either by a small 

 addition of sugar or by the planting of better qualities of 

 grapes. Oar vineyards produce more juice to the acre 

 than in California. Take one acre of vines planted 8x10, 

 say, 545 vines, will probably produce the third year, about 

 1,500 pounds of grapes, which, at 7.50 gallons per 100 

 pounds, make 112 gallons; but the fourth, fifth and suc- 

 ceeding years the crop will be much larger, provided the 

 vineyard is kept up to its highest producing capacity. 

 Three tons is an average which will give you 450 gallons 

 of pure juice. 



Some of this wine, the white, when sweet, finds a ready 

 market, but claret, port or sauterne, will require one year 

 or much more to produce a perfect wine; the repeated 

 racking off of young wines give them in the following years, 

 their brilliant clear color, their bouquet and fruitiness. 



The market value of new wine is fifty or seventy-five 

 cents a gallon, but old, matured wines range from Si-5°' 

 $1.75 to $2.50 per gallon. 



What is to be aimed at is quality^ and we can produce 

 that, as shown by the samples. Poor wines, and quantities 

 of them, will never do; there are too many gallons already 

 on the market, but good^ sound and health-giving prodjccts, 

 which go to build up the worn-out system and help to 



