116 CELLABTNG. 



preserved in wooden casks, since many different pro- 

 perties of wines are, or may be, affected by this cir- 

 cumstance. The excellence of the wine is necessarily 

 affected by the wood of the vessels in which it is 

 preserved. Wine dealers have learned to understand 

 and distinguish the effect produced in this manner 

 upon the taste, colour, strength, and other qualities 

 of wine, and Faure* has given us a detailed investi- 

 gation. He pulverised the commonest kind of oak 

 wood, exhausted it with ether, alcohol, and water, and 

 obtained wax, quercin, quercitron (a yellow colouring 

 matter), tannic acid, vegetable mucus, albuminous 

 matter, gall-extract, and bitter extractive matter. 



Quercin is a substance which, though easily soluble 

 in alcohol and ether, is but sparingly so in water. 

 It is found in all kinds of oak-wood, and cannot be 

 entirely without influence upon the wine, since it has 

 a peculiar odour. 



If wine be put into oaken casks there will be an 

 increase in the tannic acid, which already exists in it 

 in larger or smaller quantities. But albumen is also 

 present in the oak-wood, and as soon as the watery 

 ingredients of the wine have dissolved the tannic 

 acid, it will unite with the albuminous matter, and 

 adhere to the wood. 



Quercitron (the yellow colouring matter) is of im- 

 portance if we would know the action of the wood of 

 the casks in which wine is stored. Eigaud has ana- 



* Agricult. Praticien, 1852, p. 125. 





