A Treatise on the Culture of the Vine and, and the Art of Making Wine/Part 1/Chapter 1
PART FIRST.
CHAPTER FIRST.
Of the influence of Climate, Soil, Exposure, Seasons, and Culture, on the Vine.
OF all the plants which cover the surface of our globe, there is, perhaps, none more sensible of the action of the numerous causes which influence vegetation, than the vine. Not only do we see it varied under different climates, but even in the same climate, we see its products changed in the most astonishing manner, in consequence of a difference in the nature of the soil, the exposure of the vineyard, or the system of cultivation pursued in it.
Causes which have no perceptible effect on other plants, act so powerfully on this, as to seem to change its nature. In all the wine countries, there are instances of vines of the same variety, cultivated in the same manner, and in contiguous fields, differing more than one-half in value, in consequence of a slight difference in their exposure, or of the slope of the hill on which they are planted.
Were we to judge of the vine, by the strength of its vegetation, or the quality of its fruits, the effects of these causes would be much less perceptible; our senses would frequently establish very slight shades of difference; but, estimating their effects by a comparison of the wines made from these fruits, we are only the more sensible of the differences, as our taste for this beverage becomes more exercised, or refined.
Before, then, we can determine the causes why the same kind of plant does not produce every where, indifferently, the same quality of wine, and establish principles by which we shall be able to foresee and announce that which ought to be, as well as to account for that which is, it is necessary that we should examine, separately and with care, what is due to each of the causes which most strongly influence the vine, and its products.
SECTION I.
Of the Influence of Climate on the Vine.
All climates are not favourable for the culture of the vine. If it grows, and seems even to vegetate with force, in the colder climates, it is not less true, that its fruit never attains a sufficient degree of maturity, and it is an observation which constantly holds just, that beyond the 50th degree of northern latitude, the juice of the grape is not capable of undergoing a fermentation, to convert it into an agreeable drink.
The flavour, and especially the saccharine principle of the grape, are effects of the uninterrupted rays of a powerful sun: where the sun's rays are less powerful and constant, the sour or acrid juice, which developes itself in the grape at its first formation, is not sufficiently elaborated, and does not lose its primitive character of greenness, before the return of winter arrests its further progress to maturity.
The unripened grape contains scarcely any sugar, and the expressed juice, when fermented, yields a sour liquor, in which the alcohol scarcely exists in sufficient quantity to impede the movements of a putrefactive fermentation.
The vine, like every other production of nature, has its appropriate climates, and, in general, it is only between the 35th and 50th degrees of northern latitude that it can be cultivated with advantage; if it flourishes at a lower latitude than 35 degrees north, the heat of the climate must be modified by natural causes, as in the Canary Islands, to which the cooling influence of the surrounding ocean, imparts the advantages of a colder clime, or measures must be resorted to for counteracting the influence of a parching atmosphere, as in some parts of Persia, where, by means of irrigation, the vine is said to be cultivated under a temperature, whose mean is, 82 degrees of Fahrenheit.
Vineyards are also to be found, and a little wine is made, as far north as the 52d degree, but on either side of the above boundaries, the wine is of a very inferior character, or requires, for its production, too much expense and care, to be a profitable article of culture. The best wines are made between the 40th and 50th degrees of latitude.
But though the climate impresses a general and indelible character on its productions, there are circumstances which modify its action: and it is only by studying, separately and carefully, the influence of each of these, that we can recognise the effect of climate in all its strength. It is thus, that we sometimes see, under the same climate, very different qualities of wine, because the differences of soil, exposure, or culture, modify the immediate influence of this grand agent.
The influence of climate, is in nothing better illustrated than in the changes which vine plants undergo, when transported to a foreign country, where the same method of culture may be pursued, on a soil of a similar nature, without the wine produced having any analogy to that which they bore on their native soil. Thus, many of the vines at the Cape of Good Hope, are said to have been originally carried out from Burgundy, and none of the Cape wines have any resemblance to those of that province. Most of the wine drank at Madrid is made from stocks originally from the same country.[1]
History informs us, that vine plants, carried from Greece into Italy, produced no longer the same wine; and that the celebrated vines of Falernum, cultivated at the foot of Vesuvius, have changed their nature.
Warm climates, in favouring the production of saccharine matter, generally produce strong spirituous wines, sugar being necessary to the formation of alcohol; while the wines produced in colder climates, though sometimes agreeably perfumed, are characterized by their want of strength, and tendency to degenerate into the acetous fermentation.
It is, however, contended by some authors[2], that an excess of saccharine matter is a defect in the grape, especially if the wine be intended for the table. Thus, in Burgundy, where the sun's rays do not act so powerfully in the production of saccharine matter, the wines are distinguished by a richness and delicacy of taste and flavour, while those produced under the burning sun of Languedoc and Provence, possessing no virtues but spirituosity, are generally employed in distillation. Not that the existence of a large portion of saccharine matter is incompatible with that of flavour and perfume, but it generally happens, that the volatile principles on which these depend, are dissipated during the lengthened fermentation necessary to convert into alcohol, the excess of saccharine matter.
SECTION II.
Of the Influence of Soil on the Vine.
The vine grows every where, and were we to judge of the quality of its produce, by the vigour of its vegetation, we should prefer for its culture the most fertile and best manured soils; but experience proves, that the quality of the wine bears little relation to the luxuriance of the plant: perhaps it is not going too far to say, that the excellence of the wine is inversely, as the strength of vegetation shewn by the vine. Nature has reserved for the vine, dry, light, and free soils, and confided to those which are strong the production of corn—
"Hic segetes, illic veniunt felicius uvæ"
Rich argillaceous soils are, in all points of view, improper for the vine; their firmness prevents the dissemination of the minute fibres of the roots, and their coldness is prejudicial to the plant. If a light shower falls, it is evaporated before it sinks beneath the surface, and the same coherence, which prevented the entrance of a less degree of moisture, opposes itself to the evaporation of those heavy rains which penetrate deeper. Thus, the root seldom receives moisture but in excess, and the air and heat, finding the same obstacles to their entrance and circulation as the water, a perpetual coldness in the soil checks the vigour of the plant, or an excess of moisture rots its roots, and causes its decay.
There are, however, soils rich in nutritious substances, which, containing a larger proportion of siliceous or calcareous matter, do not partake of the hurtful qualities of those in which argil predominates. In these, the vine grows freely, but this very strength of vegetation, as has been before observed, is essentially hurtful to the quality of the grape, which, with difficulty, attains to maturity, and produces a wine without strength or flavour. If, then, a rich soil is free and open, the vine planted in it flourishes vigorously, producing in abundance a wine, weak, watery, and destitute of perfume; but, in wet and humid soils of every description, it languishes and dies.
Calcareous soils are in general favourable to the vine; dry, free, and light, they every where afford a free circulation to the water with which they are impregnated, and allow the numerous tender ramifications of the roots to extend in all directions, in search of the juices which are appropriated by the plant. Their stimulating nature, too, which, while it increases the energy of the plant, does not impart to it an excess of nutriment, points them out as peculiarly fitted for its culture. Accordingly, we find the soils of many celebrated vineyards to be calcareous. Some of the best soils of Champagne, rest upon a substratum of chalk, in which the vine is long of coming to maturity; but in which, when once rooted and established, it maintains itself with vigour. Chalk also enters largely into the composition of the soil, which produces the celebrated white wines of Sauterne.
A mixture of stones is always an important addition even to a soil possessing all the requisites of dryness, lightness, and porosity. The root spreads itself easily in a soil rendered penetrable by a mixture of rounded stones, and while the bed of pebbles on the surface oppose themselves to the evaporation of the necessary moisture, they facilitate the filtration of what may be in excess, and reflect back on the grape, the benign influence of the sun's rays.
Volcanic soils have been always observed to produce delicious wines. These virgin soils having been long elaborated in the interior of the earth by subterranean fires, present an intimate mixture of all the earthy principles. When this semi-vitrified substance is decomposed by the combined action of air and water, it furnishes all the elements of a good vegetation, and the fire with which it is impregnated, seems to pass successively into all the plants confided to it.
Some of the best vineyards of the south of France, are situated on the debris, or waste of volcanoes. The decomposed lava at the foot of Vesuvius, produces the famous Italian wine, called Lachryma Christi; Tokay wine is produced on a volcanic soil; and the soil of the hills of Campania, famous for the Falernum of the ancients, is said to be coloured yellow, by the sulphur it contains.
There are many places on the varied surface of the globe, where granite has ceased to retain that character of hardness, and indestructibility, which generally distinguishes that primitive rock; and where, pulverized by the action of the elements during many ages, it is reduced to a sand of a finer or coarser description. The soil of the vine yards of Hermitage, and of many others of great celebrity, consists of this decomposed gravel, which seems to possess all the requisites for a superior produce of wine, uniting that lightness and porosity which permits the roots to spread, the water to filtrate, and the air to penetrate, while the stony surface arrests the rays of the sun before they penetrate to the roots.
It may be concluded, from what has been said, that the vine may be cultivated advantageously in a great variety of soils. The conclusion may even be drawn, that the intrinsic nature of the soil is of less importance, than that it should be porous, free, and light. In Burgundy, a light friable soil, of a reddish or black colour is reputed the best. It has been observed, that the best vineyards of Bordeaux, are on a light, gravelly, and stony soil, partly consisting of decomposed granite: and, when this rests upon a bed of rich sand, it is said to possess the rare property of producing in large quantity, without any deterioration in the quality.
The sandy soil will, in general, produce a delicate wine, the calcareous soil a spirituous wine, the decomposed granite a brisk wine.
When a soil is to be chosen for a vineyard, all cold, compact, and wet soils, and such as are easily hardened by the sun's rays, are to be avoided. If it is more profitable, or desirable, to obtain a large quantity of wine for the general consumption of a country, or for distillation, good rich soils may be resorted to; thus, on the banks of the Cher and Loire, in France, they not only cultivate the vine on rich soils, but even with the aid of manure. But it is an observation, which in general is just, that the soils of the best vineyards are those, which contain little nutritious matter, and four-fifths of the vineyards of France are planted in soils which would not pay the expense of cultivation in another form.
SECTION III
Of the Influence of Exposure on the Vine[3].
The same climate, culture, and soils of the same nature furnish, frequently, wines of a very different quality. We daily see a hill covered with vines, afford, under different aspects, the most amazing diversity of produce. One would imagine that every variety of climate and soil had concurred in furnishing products, which are the natural fruits of contiguous fields differently exposed.
This difference in product, owing to exposure, is apparent throughout the vegetable kingdom. Timber, cut on the northern aspect of a hill, is much less combustible than what grows on a southern exposure. Odorous and savoury plants lose their odour and savour when produced on a rich soil, looking to the north. Pliny has observed, that the timber on the south of the Appenines, was superior to what grew on a different aspect, and every one knows the effects of exposure on leguminous plants, and fruits.
These phenomena, observable in all the products of vegetation, are peculiarly remarkable in the vine. A vine looking to the south, produces fruits which seem of a different nature from those of one looking northwards. Even in a vineyard, having everywhere the same exposure, the greater or less inclination of the surface has its effect in producing modifications in the quality of the wine, while the summit, the middle, and the base of a hill, furnish product's entirely different.
The naked summit receives every instant the impression of changes and movements in the atmosphere;—there the winds agitate the plant;—fogs produce there a more constant, and more direct impression,—the temperature of the air is colder, and more variable;—there, also, hoar frosts are more frequent; and all these causes combine in lessening the quantity of fruit, in checking its progress to maturity, and in giving to the wine an inferior character to that of the middle of a hill, which escapes the effects of these agents, or is exposed to them in a limited degree.
The disadvantages of the base, are of a different nature; there the plant flourishes more vigorously in a better soil, but its fruit contains less saccharine matter, and less flavour than in the middle region. The air being more charged with humidity, and the earth with moisture, the grape is more enlarged by the abundance of sap or common fluid furnished to the plant, but its peculiar principles are imperfectly elaborated. When the wine, at the summit of the Clos Vougeot, one of the most celebrated vineyards of Burgundy, sells for 600 francs, that of the middle brings 900, and that of the base only 300.
The exposure, most favourable for the vine is between the east and south. Hills sloping to the south, produce, in general, excellent wines, and when they rise, by a gentle elevation from a plain, present the most favourable situation for a vineyard. A flat soil, and one with too great a slope, have each their disadvantages; a gentle inclination presents the most favourable disposition for the water to spread itself, and filter through the whole soil, without losing itself too fast, or being detained too long.
An open exposure is also a point of capital importance,
apertos,
"Bacchus amat colles, ."
A good vineyard is seldom found in a close valley, where the plant is exposed to the injurious effects of cold currents of air, or is endangered by sudden gusts of wind; if the bottom of the valley is the course of a river, the situation is still worse, because the fogs and exhalations have a tendency to produce a constant humidity, always hurtful in its effects.
Keeping these principles in view, the differences of opinion among agriculturists, on this point, may be in a great measure reconciled. Some disapprove of situations near a river, for vines, on account of the fogs and agueous exhalations it engenders—while others defend these situations, by asserting the superiority of the wines of the Rhone, the Garonne, the Marne, the Rhine, and many others.—The neighbourhood of a river is only dangerous where the hills rise precipitately from its banks. In every case, where the slope of the hill rises gradually, and forms an open and extensive valley, not shaded from the rays of the sun, and not liable to be enveloped in the fogs which frequently rise from the beds of rivers, their neighbourhood is, at least, indifferent.
An eastern exposure, though favourable to the vine, is less so than one to the south, as it is generally observed, that vines looking to the east, are more injured by frost. The rays of the rising sun striking suddenly on the tender leaves and flower of a plant, frozen during a cold night, has the effect of burning and destroying them, in the same manner as mortification is the consequence of exposing to a sudden heat, a limb which has been frost-bitten[4].
A northern exposure has always been considered the most unfavourable, as the vine, from being most exposed to cold and moist winds, is most subject to injury from frosts and fogs, and the grape seldom attains its maturity where it enjoys, in a small degree, the rays of the sun.
A western exposure is little favourable for the vine. The heat of the day has already dried up all moisture from the soil, when the evening sun, darting his oblique rays under the foliage, scorches and withers the fruit, stopping its vegetation before it has attained its full growth, and inducing a premature ripeness. It is the more unfavourable, that the grape, dried and heated by the last rays of the sun, passes suddenly to a temperature cold and moist; and, that the juices dilated by the heat, and spread through the whole plant, are there fixed, coagulated, and frequently frozen instantaneously.
In Champagne, there is a difference of value, of one-third, between a soil of the same quality, exposed to the south, and one exposed to the west.
Even in a vineyard, situated with every advantage of exposure, nothing should be allowed to interrupt the direct action of the mid-day sun, which, of all causes contributing to the perfection of the grape, is certainly the most powerful. The practice of planting fruit trees in a vineyard, is hence disapproved of, though in some districts it is conceived that they are advantageous in protecting the vines from the effects of frost, and from this idea it is quite common to see the peach, the olive, the apple, and the walnut trees, planted in vineyards. In many districts, also, where, from other causes, the wine is, at the best, of an indifferent quality, they are planted solely on account of their fruit. The least dangerous, are the peach and the olive.
It may be concluded, from what has been said, that the most favourable exposure of the vine is towards the south; and that an eastern, though inferior to a southern exposure, is preferable either to one to the west, or to the north; the vine which enjoys the greater portion of the sun's rays being that which, with equal soil and culture, will generally produce the best wine.
If, in the immense variety of vineyards which cover a portion of Europe, there are exceptions to this rule, it is when the culture and soil supply the defect of exposure, and are directed to the production of a wine which derives its excellencies from qualities independent of spirituosity; but the principle established is strictly just, when the object of cultivation is to obtain that perfect maturity of the grape, and developement of its saccharine principles, which alone form the base, and the character of a perfect grape.
SECTION IV.
Of the Influence of the Seasons on the Vine.
From the principles which have been established, in treating of the effects of climate, soil, and exposure on the vine, it naturally follows, that the season impresses a character on its produce, as it may be distinguished for cold or heat, for humidity or dryness. Accordingly, it is found that a cold and rainy season, in a climate naturally warm and dry, produces on the grape the same effect as a colder climate.
The vine delights in heat, and the grape only attains to perfection in a dry soil, struck by the rays of an ardent sun. When a rainy season induces a constant humidity in the ground, and maintains a damp and moist temperature in the atmosphere, the grape neither acquires saccharine principle nor flavour, and the wine made from it is weak and insipid. These descriptions of wine keep with difficulty; the minute proportion of alcohol which they contain, is insufficient to prevent their decomposition, and the large proportion of that principle, which is the yeast of the fermentation, accelerates the movements of an incipient degeneration; all wines of this description contain a large portion of malic acid, from which they derive a peculiar taste, a sourness which is not acetous, and which impresses a character the more marked, as the wines are less spirituous.
The influence of the seasons is so well known in the wine countries, that the nature of the wine can be predicted long before the period of the vintage. When the season is cold, the wine is generally rough and ill tasted: when wet, the wine is in large quantity, but weak, and though producing little spirit, is usually (at least in the south of France), employed in distillation, both on account of its wanting durability, and those qualities which recommend it as a drink.
The rains which fall at the period, or the approach of the vintage, are always the most dangerous, as the grape has then neither time nor vigour to elaborate the juices with which it is impregnated, and presents, for fermentation, a liquor which is too fluid, and holding in solution too little saccharine matter to produce a strong good bodied wine.
The rains which fall at the moment of the flowering, are also to be dreaded, from their tendency to cause the running of the parts of fructification, and the imperfection of the fruit. But those genial showers, which fall when the fruit begins to enlarge, furnish to the plant the principal elements of its organization, and if heat follows to facilitate the elaboration of these elements, the grape can hardly fail to reach perfection. The most favourable weather for the grape, is that which gives an alternation of heat, and gentle showers.
High winds are always prejudicial to vines; they parch the stocks, the fruit, and the soil, and produce, especially on strong soils, a hard and compact crust at the surface, which prevents the free circulation of the air and water, and keeps an injurious dampness at the root.
The influence of fogs is, in many points of view, injurious to vines; besides the putrid miasm they too often deposit on the fruits of the field, they moisten the surface of the plant, without penetrating farther, and when struck by the rays of the sun, their evaporation is instantaneous. Such sudden changes are always prejudicial to plants, and from the sensibility of the vine, are peculiarly so to it. The injury is still more severe, when, as frequently happens, they are followed by hoar frosts, its extent being in proportion to the degree of moisture congealed, and to the quickness of its evaporation. When such occur, during the critical season of the vines flowering, they generally prove fatal to the hopes of the year, but their effects are to be dreaded by the fruit at all seasons.
Although heat is necessary to ripen the grape, and to furnish it with sugar, it would be an error to imagine that heat alone is capable of producing these desirable properties. It can be but considered, as the agent, in elaborating the juices with which the earth is supposed to be impregnated in sufficient quantity. There must be heat, no doubt, but that heat must not spend itself on a parched soil, in which case, it would scorch rather than vivify
The good condition of the vine, and the perfection of its fruit, are the effects of a just proportion;—of a perfect equilibrium between the water which furnishes aliment to the plant, and the heat which alone gives to it the power of elaborating that aliment, and extracting from it those principles which constitute the excellence of wines.
SECTION V.
Of the Influence of Culture on the Vine.
Notwithstanding—that a concurrence of so many favourable circumstances, with regard to soil, exposure, and seasons, is necessary to bring the grape to that degree of perfection which, with proper management, insures a good wine; the vine, in climates favourable for it, is a hardy plant.
Though the vines, which now cover a portion of Europe, came originally from the warmer climates of Asia, and spreading gradually through Greece and Italy, accompanied the blessings of civilization, and the amelioration of climate to the western states; the vine is indigenous in many parts of Europe, and in all the climates suited to its nature in both hemispheres in the new world. In Carolina and Florida, wild vines cover the ground in all directions, and are frequently an impediment to the traveller, by entangling his horse's feet in their branches, which in some places trail along the ground, and in others overtop the highest trees. In the wilds of New Holland, also, there is a kind of vine indigenous to the soil.
But, though the vine is thus the spontaneous production of nature, the art of man is requisite to bring it to perfection. Like other fruits and plants cultivated in our gardens, the fruit of the cultivated vine seems of a different nature from that which grows wild in the fields. The influence of culture even extends to compensate, in a certain degree, the defects of climate, as the cultivated grape attains its maturity in a higher latitude by seven degrees, than where the wild vine ripens its austere and diminutive fruit.
Varied as the vine is, by so many natural causes, it is not surprising that it should also be sensible to the effects of culture. A vine of an excellent variety, abandoned to itself, would produce an enormous quantity of grapes the first year, but they would with difficulty ripen, and their quality would be inferior. The following year it would send out more numerous and more feeble shoots, and the fruit would be increased in proportion, but in the same proportion also would its size be diminished—year after year would alter its qualities, till nothing remained to distinguish it from the wilding of the hedge.
To prevent this degeneration, it is necessary that it should be pruned, and the manner of pruning the vine has its influence on the wine. The greater the number of branches left on a stock, the greater will be the abundance of grapes, but the more inferior will be the quality of the wine, and the shorter will be the period of the vine's life.
But, besides pruning the luxuriance of the plant, and preventing it from wasting its strength in large quantities of fruit and foliage, it is necessary, as happens in few other cases[5], that nutritious substances should be sparingly supplied to it. Manures which are so necessary to most plants, and especially to those cultivated for their farinaceous matter, are injurious here. It is true, they add to the vigour of vegetation, but they debase the quality of the wine. Accordingly, we find that, in some wine districts, the use of dung was prohibited by law. The reputation of the wine was considered public property. "By public decree," says Olivier de Serres, "the use of dung was forbid at Gaillac, lest it should hurt the character of their white wines with which they supplied their neighbours of Toulouse, Montauban, Castres, and other places, and thus deprive them of a trade, from which they drew the most considerable part of their revenues."
As, however, circumstances which can only be estimated by each proprietor, sometimes makes it advantageous to plant vines on good soils, with a view to obtain a larger quantity of wine, though of an inferior quality, so with the same views it is by no means uncommon to assist poor soils by the addition of manure.
Indeed, in some countries the pruning knife is so sparingly applied, and the soil where it grows so rich, that the vine seems to change the character of a shrub for that of a tree. Travellers speak with rapture, of bowers formed by the vine, intertwining itself with, and overtopping the highest branches of, the olive and the mulberry;—of the delightful shade of their contrasted foliage, and the refreshing coolness of their delicious fruit;—of the richness of that soil, which, in addition to these, can bear heavy crops of wheat in the intervals of their festooned rows;—and of the benignity of that clime, where the husbandman sees the same field "run o'er" with the gifts of Ceres and Bacchus, and with the "amber store" of the olive, or the mulberry, from whose leaves the silk worm draws its delicate thread, to administer to his luxury and pride.
Of such a nature are the descriptions of more than one traveller through Lombardy, and other parts of Italy, and few could visit the same scenes without participating in the feelings by which they were dictated. Prospects of a similar nature also greet and delight the traveller in many provinces of Spain, and even in the most southern districts of France, the vine is found embracing the branches of the elm and the almond, and hanging its clusters from their highest tops. But it is not in scenes like these that the vine sheds its richest juice—not all the bunches which hang in profusion from these lofty trees enjoy the maturing influence of the sun's rays, and such as reach maturity, are universally found to be destitute of those principles which fermentation converts to a generous wine.
It is thus possible by culture, to raise the creeping vine above the highest trees; nay, to change its twisted and deformed stock, to a noble trunk, which will vie in longevity with the venerable oak. Evelyn informs us, from Theophrastus, of a vine, "which had grown to that bulk and woodiness, as to make a statue of Jupiter, and columns in Juno's temple, and that, at present, it is found that the great doors of the cathedral at Ravenna are made of such vine tree planks, some of which are twelve feet long, and fifteen inches broad; the whole of that country producing vines of a prodigious growth. Such another in Margiana, is spoken of by Strabo, that was twelve feet in circumference, and Pliny mentions one of 600 years old in his time.
Vines of such an age and stature, may form an attraction to the naturalist, and the traveller may forget his weariness in the bowers formed by their intermarriage with the olive, but the wine which is best calculated to make glad his heart, is the production of a stinted shrub, and a meagre soil.
Accordingly, the cultivation of the best vineyards is directed, not only to reduce the luxuriance of the plant, but to allow that which remains a scanty nourishment, and to suffer it to bear only such a quantity of fruit, as it is found capable of elaborating to the highest degree of perfection.
The practical details by which the principles established in the foregoing pages, are applied in pursuance of this object, form the subject to be treated of in a succeeding chapter.
- ↑ This sentence of Chaptal, of course implies, that the wines alluded to are unlike those of Burgundy. In a topographical account of vineyards, I find the following passage:— "The principal vineyards of New Castile, are in the southern provinces of La Mancha and Toledo. Their products are very considerable, and in general of a good quality; but the wines they make in the north are all dry, rough, and destitute of body and spirit. A great deal of the wines of La Mancha are sent to Madrid, where the inhabitants, in easy circumstances, use them as common wines, (vins d'ordinaire). They are less coloured, less strong, and, consequently, more delicate than the greater part of Spanish wines. The best are cultivated in the vicinity of Valdepennas, and it is affirmed, that they have an analogy to our good Burgundy wines, of which they unite almost all the qualities."
- ↑ Labergerie, "Cours d'Agriculture."
- ↑ It is almost unnecessary to remark, that these observations are only literally applicable in the northern hemisphere. I have preferred stating them as I found them, because the illustrations are all drawn from it, and it will be an easy matter to apply the general principles, which it is the object of this chapter to establish, as far as mere latitude is concerned. They will, of course, in their application to New South Wales, be modified by various circumstances, which it would probably be difficult for even the oldest and most observant resident fully to appreciate.
- ↑ It is remarkable, that English gardeners prefer an eastern exposure, for reasons the very reverse of the above. "An open aspect to the east," says Abercrombie, in his Practical Gardener, "is itself a point of capital importance in laying out a garden or orchard, on account of the early sun. When the sun can reach the garden at its rising, and continue a regular influence, increasing as the day advances, it has a gradual and most beneficial effect in dissolving the hoar frost which the past night may have scattered over young buds, leaves, and blossoms, or setting fruit. On the contrary, when the sun is excluded from the garden till about ten in the morning, and then suddenly darts on it with all the force derived from considerable elevation, the situation is bad, particularly for fruit, bearing plants in the spring months; the powerful rays of heat at once melt the icey particles, and immediately acting on the moisture thus created, scald the tender blossom, which drops as if nipped by a malignant blight."
In this, there seems to me to be no contradiction, but what may be accounted for by difference of climate.
The sun, in England, seldom rises free from clouds, and never possesses at his rising, the same power as in wine countries; consequently, the change from cold to heat is not so sudden. While the temperature of the atmosphere, which, in wine countries, is high enough to melt the frost, and gradually dilate the vessels contracted by it, after the sun rises, though his direct rays are excluded, is too low to have the same effect in England, and hence the injury sustained by the increased strength of his rays.— - ↑ It is observed, in the West Indies, that when sugar plantations are richly manured, the quantity of sugar produced is large, but the quality is inferior. It is for this reason that the sugars of the rich alluvial soils of Demerara are so much inferior to those of Barbadoes, which grow on a soil more exhausted. It is also observed, that the berry of the West India coffee produces two large seeds, while the coffee plant of Arabia yields only one small seed in the berry. West India coffee grows on richly manured soils, while that of Arabia grows on a poor and meagre soil; but though much inferior in size and produce, it is infinitely superior in the flavour, for which coffee is valued.