98 APPENDIX. 



do this until they have reached their utmost maturity, unless 

 they should be seized by the rot. 



I formerly supposed (being influenced by the opinion of 

 foreign writers), that every object could be obtained by the 

 addition of good sugar. Experience convinces me of the 

 contrary. Sugar will be converted into alcohol, and give 

 strength to the wine. But it will not give the same richness of 

 aroma and flavor as the fruit, so ripe as to require no sugar. 



In some parts of Europe, to give richness to their wines, 

 they gather their fruit and partially dry them before pressing, 

 to carry off the watery particles from the fruit. This wine 

 sells at a high price. Before gathering the fruit, its richness 

 should be ascertained, as its color is no certain indication. 

 This richness, when the maturity is the same, will vary in 

 different varieties. To test its maturity, press out a tumbler 

 full of must, and if you have no saccharometer, put in it a 

 fresh laid hen's egg. If of proper maturity, the egg will then 

 rise the size of a quarter of a dollar above the juice. If not 

 rich, it will sink. The Catawba should, in favorable seasons, 

 weigh from 90 to 97 degrees, by our saccharometers. 



Many use fresh brandy pipes, to put their must or wines in. 

 They are destructive to the aroma and flavor of the wine. 

 Alcohol should never be added, unless the wine be too weak 

 to keep, and when this is done, it should be distilled from the 

 same kind of wine. If not, you injure its aroma and flavor. 

 Spirit is never necessary, when the fruit is matured, unless it 

 be in a hot climate. Then it seems to be indispensable, as 

 the following hot season brings on the acetous fermentation. 

 An intelligent gentleman of South Carolina, Mr. GUIGNARD, 

 and another friend, both wrote to me to this effect. So much 

 so does the value of the wine depend on the maturity of the 

 fruit, and great neatness in manufacture, that in buying, this 

 winter, from a person in the vicinity of Louisville, I paid him 

 for his new wine, three times the sum that I paid him for his 

 wine made in the year 1848. When that was made, he 



