10 WINE AND THE ART OF WINE TASTING. 



This division is of no little hygienic importance, wines of different color 

 having as distinct effects on our constitution as wines of different age, 

 alcoholicity, or acidity. 



White wines, as is well known, are obtained from white grapes, or 

 from red grapes which, instead of being crushed and fermented in a 

 mass, are pressed, and the must fermented separately; that is, not in 

 contact with the pomace or solid parts of the grapes. 



I call attention to the fact that white wine can be made from red 

 grapes, because wines so made have exactly the same action on our 

 system as have white wines made from white grapes. 



Certainly the following from Guyot is very true: 



Wine which has been fermented in contact with the stems, skins, and seeds of the 

 grapes is very different from that which has been fermented separately. The latter wine 

 is white, the other red, and the antithesis, though expressed nere simply by the oppo- 

 sition of color, does not consist in the least in this difference of color, which is only an 

 accident. The real difference consists in the special and often opposite hygienic quali- 

 ties of these two kinds of wine. Nowadays they make red wines which have all the 

 hygienic properties of white wines, and it is possible to produce white wines which 

 would have all the hygienic properties of red. All that is necessary to obtain this last 

 result is to ferment the must of white grapes with the skins, seeds, and stems, in the 

 same way as red wine is treated; in this way all the effects are obtained of a rapid 

 decomposition and solution by maceration of the principles and products which are 

 not found in the juice of the grape. * * 



I insist on the true distinction of wines obtained by the fermentation of the juice of 

 the grape completely isolated from its accessories, and those made by fermentation of 

 the juice, together with all, or at least part of the rest of the grape a distinction quite 

 independent of the color. Nothing is more alien or of less importance to the quality 

 of a wine than its color. It may be a sign an indication but it is never a quality of 

 itself. By the majority of consumers color is looked upon as a guarantee of the purity, 

 quality, and strength of the wine. It is on account of this considering color as a sign 

 of quality that unscrupulous dealers make use of it to commit innumerable frauds. 



White wines are in general diffusible stimulants of the nervous system; if they are 

 light they act rapidly on the'physical organization, of which they intensify all the func- 

 tions. It seems that they escape just as quickly through the skin and mucous mem- 

 branes, and, above all, with the urine; their action, then, is of short duration. 



Unlike white wines, red wines are tonic and persistent stimulants of the nerves, the 

 muscles, and the digestive organs. Their organic action being slower is more prolonged; 

 they do not unduly excite the perspiration nor the excretions, and their general action 

 is astringent, persistent, and concentrated. 



Moreover, the common opinion, founded on daily experience, leaves no doubt of the 

 real difference, in their sensual and organic effects, between white wines and red. 



Of equal importance are the following words of Dr. Gauber: 



If one should divide the grapes gathered from a vineyard of the "Graves" of the 

 Gironde into two parts, and of one make white wine and of the other red, and then, 

 at the end of four years, make a careful tasting of these two wines which have been 

 carefully treated during these four years, what will be the result? Made from a raw 

 material apparently identical, will they be equally developed and equally mature? The 

 white wine will have aged the most. 



Will they produce the same effect, the same degree of stimulation, on our organs? Let 

 us collect the sensations produced by one and the other in the order in which they are 

 produced. 



1. A glass of white wine, well made and dry, the moment it enters the mouth develops 

 a bright and penetrating aroma, and leaves, in passing, an impression, agreeable it is 

 true, but fugitive and almost hot. Hardly has it reached the surface of the stomach 

 when it causes a feeling of warmth which, in less than ten minutes in the case of certain 

 healthy but impressionable constitutions, becomes very intense. Sometimes the action, 

 by sympathetic radiation, is reflected from the stomach to the head with the prompti- 

 tude of the electric fluid. Generally, after an hour or less, a sensation is felt as of a 

 pressure either on the two temples or around the whole head; the hand is instinctively 

 passed over the forehead as though to free it from some load. Sometimes a feeling of 

 painful fullness of the brain accompanies these effects. The irritation is communicated 

 from the gastric and nervous centers to the whole body. It shows itself by increased 

 warmth, often irregularly distributed, of the body (with irritable people the palm of the 

 hand often becomes unpleasantly hot and dry); by a need of movement, of displace- 

 ment rather than of exercise (with people of the disposition mentioned above this 

 need is shown by an internal agitation, by slight muscular tremblings accompanied by 

 shooting pains that strike, with the rapidity of lightning, different parts of the body). 



