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245 



CULTIVATION of toe VINI1. 



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fpirits in a very great degree, and leave the body in £i 

 weak and languid ftate, and fubjed: it to harflinefs, to turn 

 eager or vapid in a fliort time; thefe vnnes grow worfe 

 liot better by age; many inftances of this kind we meet 

 with in the French clarets, among which, where one hogf- 

 head proves good, found and wholefome, ten, not to fay 

 twenty, prove harfli, eager and difagreeable: Thefe con- 

 fiderations lead me to think, that the prefent raanagment 

 calls loudly for a reformation ; one experiment I have made» 

 and but one, which I fhall offer with fomc farther thoughts to 

 confideration for farther improvement; but I mofl heartily 

 recommend this affair to forne public fpiriied and worthy phi- 



lofophers of the age, who by repeated experiments might 

 bring to light this important fecret, which when known 

 would be very beneficial to the nation. The experiment I 

 made was this, in a clean (lone pot, wide and open, containing 

 two gallons, I fqueezed as many Burgundy grapes as nearly 

 filled it, with the liquor and fkins; the ftalks I left out. It 

 flood in a dry room covered with a coarfe dry towel four 

 double, four days and nights fermenting, I then flrained 

 it off and with my hands mafhed the fkins very well, by 

 this means I obtained a full deep tinfture of that kind of 

 purple that is peculiar to the Burgundy wine; I then left 

 it to ferment, in a large cafe bottle, after the firft and 



fecond fermentations were over, 1 found about a quart of 

 rich fediment at the bottom and a pretty thick fkin form- 

 ed on the top, the fmcll was very pleafant and truly vinous, 



the juft indications of a found healthy wine. By this ex- 

 periment I found that, three days fermentation, allowing 

 the firfl day for heating, which is preparatory to fermen- 

 tation, (the degrees of heat are mentioned by Boerhaave, 

 Hoffman and others) vv^as fuificient to obtain a tinfture, 

 with the help of fqueezing the flclns a fecond time, without 

 injuring the wine, and I found what red pulp remained 

 adhering to the fkins, feparated from them very eafily, 

 and by the colour of the wine, before the fecond fqueezing, 

 that the fermentation had diffolved moft of this pulp, or 



extraded 





