ON COLONIAL WINES. 251 
the tannic acid by the chemical action they exert 
upon it. 
Not living in a wine-producing country, the English 
people have no proper terms to express accurately many 
operations on wine, and thus such terms as "fining" 
have a more or less confused meaning. We say when 
wine is rough, austere on the palate, bitter—" fine " it. 
White of egg, isinglass, bullock's blood, and milk, &c., 
will do the fining such wine requires. They will 
remove the tannic acid, and probably some others. 
Again, a wine, smooth and sweet to the palate, is 
muddy, off colour, &c. : we say, "fine" it-and that 
means, clear it; but in this case albumen, isinglass 
&a, would ruin it, and sand or Spanish clay is alone 
admissible. All fining is a sort of filtration; and as 
you cannot put the wine through an ordinary filter 
you put a filter through the wine. The insoluble 
compounds forme4 by albuminous matters and tannic 
acid on one hand, and the sand or Spanish clay on the 
other, constitute such a filter. 
SOME PEESONAL MATTEES. 
I have been twitted at times by teetotallers with 
devoting too much attention to these matters ; and 
certainly I can say with Cicero, « Limit otioso esse 
mM;" but I preferred to fill up my time in away 
that was pleasant and instructive to myself, and not 
without showing a prospect of future utility to the 
country of my adoption. Mingled with the above 
was, very likely, a little harmless vanity ; for in a new 
country, and in a limited population, a little man is apt 
to delude himself by thinking that he is a big one ■ 
