MANUFACTURE OF WINE, AND KOT IN GRAPES. 97 



to be cultivated on a large scale. The grape of this vine is 

 more spicy than the Isabella, and the quality of the wine 

 much superior ; but its yield is less, and its cultivation costs 

 much more labor. The Catawba grape is extensively culti- 

 vated in Ohio and Missouri, and is the grape from which all 

 the better sorts of American Champagne are manufactured. 

 It improves, like the Hock grape, for a period of thirty years, 

 after which it declines and becomes gradually unfit for the 

 production of wine. The vineyards must then be renewed. 

 The Catawba and Isabella grapes resemble the German and 

 French grapes in many respects ; but their skins are thicker 

 and less transparent, and the interior is more pulpy, or 

 "fleshy," as the Reading and Ohio vintners call it. Cultiva- 

 tion will, no doubt, remedy the defect. The time of the blos- 

 soming is about the same as in France ; but the vintage is a 

 month earlier. Where the vintner, in Germany and France, 

 must cut the leaves to afford sun for his grapes, the American 

 must try to shade them if he would bring them to maturity. 

 For this reason, I suppose, nature has provided the Ameri- 

 can grape with a thicker and richer foliage than any other 

 grape in the world. 



MANUFACTURE OF WINE, AND ROT IN GRAPES. 



To the Wine Committee of the Horticultural Society, Cincinnati : 

 Gentlemen: — Each year's experience proves, that too little 

 neatness and care are generally observed in gathering and 

 selecting the fruit, in pressing out the juice, and having clean, 

 pure casks, and a cool cellar. After racking in the spring, a 

 cool cellar is indispensable, and few if any of our common 

 cellars, are cool enough. They are too much affected by the 

 outward air, and all jarring from the passage of wagons, or 

 other causes, is injurious. The casks, after racking in the 

 spring, should be always kept full and air-tight. We espe- 

 cially err in gathering our grapes too soon. We should never 



