116 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE, 



something beside water. "We will not attempt to discuss the 

 subject of total abstinence, or whether wine is better than water, 

 but when we look over the past history of man, we find him 

 ahvays attempting to improve or change the works of nature. 

 He is not content with the fruits and vegetables of earth as he 

 finds them, but is continually trying to bring about a change, or, 

 as we express it, an improvement. He has changed the wild 

 crab to a luscious Newtown pippin, the wild pear of Prussia, 

 which the swine refused to eat, into a Virgalieu or Duchesse 

 d'Angouleme. Not content with these fruits at one season only, 

 he must have them throughout the year. So he has produced 

 the Madeleine and the Eastern Beurre. It is to this spirit of 

 improvement, or desire to change that which nature has given 

 us, that we are indebted for the invention of wine, for wine in 

 its pure state is only the nutritious portion of the grape, pre- 

 served so that it may be in condition for use at any time of the 

 year, when our wants or pleasures desire it. 



That good fruit of any variety is a promoter of health, no 

 one will pretend to deny, and a good and pure wine made from 

 good grapes, has likewise been acknowledged for ages to be 

 a drink that is conducive to the health and the long life of the 

 partaker. But it must not be expected that a palatable wine 

 can be made from a hard and unpalatable grape, and a wine 

 made from such a grape, and made palatable by mixing some 

 foreign substance with it, is well known to be pernicious ; and we 

 have been surprised to hear men state that large quantities of 

 pure wine had been made from our northern fox grape, with 

 only the addition of sugar, when they must know that when cane 

 sugar is added to the juice of the grape, it is no longer pure 

 wine. One of our leading pomologists stated, not long since, in a 

 public lecture, that 30,000 gallons of wine were made last year 

 near Boston, Mass., from the wild grapes of the woods. It was 

 made drinkable by adding sugar. And further, the manufacturers 

 of this beverage put on the garb of public benefactors, and 

 recommend it for medicinal and sacrainental purposes. They 

 might as well recommend New England rum, for it is nearly the 

 same thing, only not quite as strong, for rum is made by fer- 

 menting cane sugar ; and when you put cane sugar into your 

 grape juice, and then let it ferment, you have rum and grape 

 juice, but not wine. The great difficulty with our grapes has 

 been that they did not contain sugar enough to create alcohol 



