AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
277 
dies may, perhaps, do some good, but we had 
not the patience to try them. It would be a 
great calamity to lose this tree and the White 
pine, or to have them seriously infested with in¬ 
sects. Some of our readers may have some¬ 
thing to report as the result of their experience. 
How to Collect and Preserve Insects. 
In reply to various inquiries the following di¬ 
rections may perhaps be satisfactory and useful: 
1. For collecting insects. A net of the thin¬ 
nest gauze, about a foot in diameter, and two 
feet in depth, attached to a circle of brass or 
iron wire (just strong enough to keep its shape 
when used) and" fastened to a light stick about 
a yard long, a pocket full of wooden pill boxes, 
some small bottles and old envelopes, are the 
simplest materials for daily use. The net is to 
aid the hands in catching insects—the boxes and 
bottles to secure them, and the envelopes to hold 
butterflies or dragon flies, which should have the 
wings folded together and be slipped in so as 
to prevent injury from fluttering. At home, 
they can be most readily killed by putting them 
into tightly corked, wide-mouthed bottles, with 
a piece of paper soaked in chloroform. A note 
book-in which to jot down localities and plants 
on which insects are taken, as well as those on 
which caterpillars feed, is valuable. If these 
notes are numbered and corresponding numbers 
attached to the insects, they can easily be refer¬ 
red to. Caterpillars should be kept in separate 
Fig. 1. 
boxes and fed until they take the pupa state. 
2. Preserving. The simplest mode for a be¬ 
ginner, is to procure tight cigar boxes and cut 
them flow n to about two and a quarter inches 
in depth, inside. Parasites and ants will not 
enter these boxes. Line the bottom with pre¬ 
pared cork, dried cornstalk pith, or soft wood. 
Slender insect pins can be procured here of 
W. H. Wood, or Theodore Schrickel, at rea¬ 
sonable prices. Insects should be set upon the 
pins above the middle, so that no part touches 
the bottom. Beetles should be pinned through 
the right wing as in fig. 2. All other insects 
through the middle of the 
thorax as in fig. 8. But¬ 
terflies and moths should 
have their wings expand¬ 
ed soon after they are 
killed, so that they may 
dry in that position. Fig. s 
1. Most other insects can 
be preserved in alcohol, 
and remain soft for some 
time, if it is not convenient 
to pin them at once. Very 
small insects may be gummed upon a bit of stiff 
paper and pinned as in fig' 4. After pinning, 
those of like families should be arranged together. 
3. Books. There is no good book for classifi¬ 
cation, as yet, in this country. Westwood’s In¬ 
troduction to Entomology is the best ever mit¬ 
ten abroad, but it is expensive, some $12 or $14. 
The best practical work for 
the student and farmer in this 
country is “Harris’ Insects 
Injurious to Vegetation,” now 
republished with many illus¬ 
trations, price $3 uncolored; 
$6 colored. Every intelligent 
farmer should have it. Fitch’s 
“ Noxious Insects,” is also of 
great value. The Entomological Society of 
Philadelphia have a publication at $1 per year, 
which is entirely devoted to this subject (E. T. 
Cresson, Sec’y.), and the Smithsonian Institute 
is from time to time issuing cata¬ 
logues of the large number of North 
American insects already described. 
Any one who takes up the study in 
earnest will find plenty to do, and 
a number of active and energetic 
persons in different, parts of the country en¬ 
gaged in the same pursuit. 
Wine. 
The statement is correct that wine is not made , 
but is a natural product. It grows, and when 
the soil, the ah-, and the sunshine and .rain of 
heaven do not furnish the article, ail the art of 
man is expended in vain in its “manufacture.” 
There are some grapes which will not, even 
when the vines are so cultivated as to receive 
the full combination of natural influences men¬ 
tioned, produce wine; others will. We may 
call any liquid which is a pleasant beverage 
“ wine,” if we will, but that does not make it so. 
Corn juice will make such a drink. Sorghum 
juice will, maple sap will, and so will birch sap, 
rhubarb juice with sugar added, sugar with al¬ 
most any addition you please, etc., etc. Wine, 
properly speaking, however, is the fermented 
j uice of the grape, which may be preserved in bot- 
tles or barrels without injurious change for any 
desirable length of time. Water and sugar in due 
proportions added to grape juice before the fer¬ 
mentation takes place, are, we believe, not re¬ 
garded legally as adulterations in European coun¬ 
tries, for the addition is innocent and it only 
puts the buyer’s knowledge to test—a tax he pays 
for not knowing the difference. All other addi¬ 
tions are adulterations and illegal. Still, water 
and sugar are adulterations, unless we admit 
that the miracle of converting water into wine 
is constantly performed in our day. 
The grapes must hang until perfectly ripe, 
and the sun allowed to shine on the leaves. Pick 
in flat baskets, so that none will be bruised. 
They get no injury if not broken, by lying 
spread out on sheets in a dry atmosphere a few 
days, or until a large quantity is gathered. 
Then pick out every unripe, decayed, hard, or 
broken berry, handling them cluster by cluster. 
They are next to be mashed, which is conveni¬ 
ently done in some of the neat little mills made 
for the purpose, which will not crush the seeds, 
or by the hands. This mashing operation must 
be done with care not to crush seeds, and so 
that every grape is broken. It is sometimes 
customary to crush with pounders in a barrel, 
but this is not so thorough or neat a plan, and 
seeds are often broken. When the grapes are 
mashed as described, they may be thrown upon 
a large stout linen cloth in a tub from which 
the must or juice may be drawn off, and then 
tied up and subjected to gentle pressure ; after¬ 
wards placed upon a cheese press and a mod- 
Fig. 3. 
erate pressure only applied. The result will be 
the securing of the sweetest and best part of the 
juice. The same maybe better done upon a 
regular wine press if one is at hand. This must 
which is thus first secured should be put di¬ 
rectly into tight barrels filled within 6 inches of 
the bung, moved to the cellar and the bung- 
holes covered with pieces of cloth. 
Meanwhile we return to the half-pressed 
pulp and skins in the press. Transfer this to 
tubs or barrels; add as much water’ as you 
have abstracted juice, and perhaps a little 
more, together with a pound to a pound and- 
a-half of sugar to the gallon of the mixture. 
Cover it close with dampened blankets so that 
no air can get to it, and suffer it to ferment, 
for several days, the slower the better, (hence 
the cooler it is the better, provided fermentation 
is not checked); occasionally stir it without 
letting the air have access. After the fermen¬ 
tation has gone on in this way from 4 to 6 
days, draw it off into barrels, transferring the 
pulp to the press, and remove all the must. This 
is barreled in the way already described, only 
the barrels may be filled a little fuller. 
There must always be provided in barrels, 
kegs or jugs, according to the quantity of 
wine undergoing fermentation, enough more to 
fill up all the barrels to the bung when the 
fermentation is over or nearly so—and this 
must be subjected to precisely the same in¬ 
fluences as that to which it is to be added. 
After the first brisk fermentation is oyer, and 
an application of the ear to the bung-hole only 
detects a slight crackling effervescence, the 
barrels may be filled full and a bung inserted hav¬ 
ing the same contrivance described and figured 
in an article on cider—a glass or block tin tube 
bent and dipping under water in a cup. This 
effectually shuts off the air while the carbonic 
acid gas escapes bubbling up through the water. 
The more uniform the temperature at which 
the fermentation of wine proceeds the better the 
result; a cool cellar which is not wet and musty, 
but has only that moisture which is natural to 
cool but well-ventilated places in warm weath¬ 
er, is subject to less variation of temperature 
than any other place we can control, being cool 
in Summer and warm in Winter. Frost should 
not enter it, and a good ventilation should be 
ever maintained, because where wine is ferment¬ 
ing much carbonic acid gas is set free, which 
might be fatal to persons entering. ' : 
Some time in the early part of Winter it will 
be noticed the bubbling from the tube in the 
bung has entirely ceased, even when the barrel 
is slightly jarred. Then remove the tube and 
bung it up tight. When warm weather comes 
(or at the time of the blooming of the vine) 
another fermentation will come on, which will be 
of short duration. Some persons leave the wine 
on the lees (or sediment) to undergo this fer¬ 
mentation, and do not rack it off (transfer it to 
other barrels) before the second Whiter, but it 
is generally considered best to draw it off into 
other barrels in February or March the first year. 
The hole is bored some inches above the bottom 
of the barrel so that the lees may not be dis¬ 
turbed. The wine should run perfectly clear 
and limpid, but if it be turbid after transferring, 
add a few ounces (3 to 5) of Cooper’s isinglass dis¬ 
solved in hot water to a pailful of the wine, and 
pour this into the barrel, which, when filled, 
bung up and mix by rolling it about; let it stand 
perfectly still a few weeks, when it may be ex¬ 
amined, and if clear, drawn off into barrels or 
bottles. Wine left upon the lees undergoes a 
much more violent Summer fermentation than 
