40 WINE AND THE ART OF WINE TASTING. 



hectolitre before putting in the finings (one tenth per m., or about 1.25 

 ounces per 100 gallons). 



SMOOTH ( Vellutato, Morbido, It.; Veloute, Moelleux, Fr.). A smooth 

 wine fills the mouth with its grateful flavors and fagrance, imparting its 

 delightful series of sensations without the slightest harshness. 



This quality is due to the presence of a certain quantity of glycerine, 

 and not to glucose, as at first one might be inclined to think. In this 

 latter case the wine would be called "amabile" (fruity). 



It is glycerine rather than glucose which gives a wine that kind of 

 smoothness which might almost be called unctuosity. 



In very high-class wines the smoothness or unctuosity is due not only 

 to glycerine, but also to other bodies which have not yet been well 

 studied; they occur more especially in wines of very favorable years; 

 that is, of years when the season has been so propitious that the grapes 

 have been able to attain an exceptionally perfect maturation. 



Many chemists have attempted to determine the nature of these sub- 

 stances. 



II Faure, who studied the wines of the Gironde, believes that this 

 unctuosity is due to the same substance as seve, a substance which is of 

 similar character to pectine and mucilage, and which he called "cenan- 

 thin." 



Batilliat claims to have found in the high-class wines of Bordeaux 

 the peculiar substance which causes their unctuosity, and which he calls 

 " croatine." 



Mulder, on the other hand, from observations made on the wines of 

 the Gironde, considers this unctuous substance as analogous to dextrine. 



Whatever may be the nature of this substance, it is useful to know 

 that the wines in which it occurs, if not well kept, are liable to undergo 

 an almost insensible fermentation, which destroys this substance, and so 

 takes away from the wine that quality which is due to it; pasteurizing or 

 heating will also deprive a wine of this quality. 



FRUITY (Amabile, It.; Suave, Fr.; the Latin, Suavis vel subdulcis). 

 A wine which is very faintly sweet on account of retaining a small 

 quantity of grape sugar or glucose. 



As is said sometimes: " Quel vinetto cosi amabile va giu senza accor- 

 gersene" 



Technically, a fruity wine cannot be said to possess seve because it 

 tends towards sweetness. However, a wine which is very slightly sweet 

 may possess a good seve in the sense that it produces those sensations 

 which are the quality of wines of the highest class. 



SWEETISH (Dolcigno, It.; Doucereux, Fr.). A wine is said to be sweetish 

 when its sweetness is undecided, unsatisfactory, and not in harmony 

 with the other components of the wine; it is due usually to a bad fer- 

 mentation and incomplete defecation, or it may be, with an ordinary 

 table wine rich in mucilaginous substances, that it is becoming sick or 

 undergoing one of those insensible fermentations, that is, the tartaric 

 fermentation, to which such wines are so subject in the spring. In the 

 latter case there is a moment when the wine can be detected in becom- 

 ing slightly sweetish, and if prompt measures are not taken it will in a 

 short time be completely spoiled. This turning flat and sweetish is due 

 to the mucilaginous substances which, under the action of dilute acids 

 and a favorable temperature, become transformed into substances resem- 

 bling dextrine and other saccharine matters, which give place, or rather 



