The amount of exposure to weather to which the vine is subjected has a marked influence upon it. Grapes gathered from the summit, the sides, or the bottom of a hill, may vary widely in quality ; and they vary also according as the land inclines towards the north, south, east, or west. Grapes grown on the top of a hill where they have been subject to many changes of tempe rature and weather are less abundant, never reach perfect maturity, and produce an inferior wine to those grown on the hill-side, where they have been sheltered from these atmospheric variations. The bottoms of hills and valleys are also unfavourable to vine-growing : in such places, the air is charged with moisture, and the soil is constantly damp, the result being that the grapes are coarse, and the leaves and wood of the vine are forced at the expense of the fruit. The best possible situation for a vineyard is on a hill-side, looking south-east or south.
That different seasons produce widely different wines is a well-known fact. In a rainy season, the fruit develops neither sugar nor aroma, the wine is weak and insipid, and can be preserved only with difficulty. A cold season yields a rough and ill-tasted wins ; and high winds and fogs are highly detrimental to the fruit. The most favourable year for vine-growing is that in which the vine flowers in warm, dry, tranquil weather, followed by gentle rains as the fruit begins to form; and when the development and maturation of the grape are assisted by constant heat, with occa done' showers and no fogs. For the harvesting of the fruit the weather should he very hot and perfectly dry.
The finest vine-growing climate and aoil is afforded by France, and this country has always produced the largeat quantity of wine ; the wines of Champagne, Burgundy and Bordeaux are, perhaps, more extensively consumed than any others. The following brief description of the pre paration of winea generally is the one commonly followed in that country.
Yintage.—The harvesting of the grapes is known as the " vintage." It ia hardly neceasary to insist on the necessity for waiting until the grapee have attained maturity, the indications of which state are suffioiently well-known. The vintage should be commenced only in fme weather and under a hot eun, and when the earth and the grapes ere thoroughly dry ; therefore not before eight o'clock in the morning. A sufficient quantity of grapes to fill a vat must alwaya be gathered at a time, end at an even temperature; failing the latter condition, they muat be exposed in a warm place till the heat of the mass is uniform. Rotten grapes are cut off close and thrown away ; green bunches arc left. To produce good wine, the crop must be gathered in three or four successive pickinga. To give the wine more eviectness and body, the grap( s are, in some districta, allowed to dry on the bunches by leaving them exposed to the heat of the sun until they become covered with a down resembling mouldiness. The bunchea arrived at a state of maturity are gathered first, and produce
very sweet, full-bodied wines. This picking being finished, the eecond ie commenced, of those bunches which have matured in the meantime, and which yield finer and more alcoholic wine than the first. A short interval is now generally allowed to elapse, that the combined influences of the hot days and dewy nights of the eud of October may complete the ripening of the remainder, which are picked over three or four times yet, the last picking including everything that remains on the vine. The harvest will scarcely be concluded in less than a month. In hot countries, the vintage will bear delay, especially when sweet winee are desired ; but where the grapes do not ripen readily, the vintage must precede the maturity of the crop, to avoid the injurious effect of the autumn rains. In this case, the deficiency of sugar must be made up by sweetening the must as hereafter explained, The bunchea of grapes are gathered, principally hy women and children, into wicker baekets, oare being taken to reject those which are sour, rotten, or scorched. The contents of tha baakets are emptied into small tuba placed in waggona, for transport to the. place where they are to undergo the various processes of conversion into wine.
Preparation of the Must.—When the crop is gathered, the must is prepared by squeezing or pressing the grapes. This may be done in a variety of ways. The most crude method—that of treading out the juice with the naked feet—ie now probably obsolete, but in many places it is done by workmen wearing large sabots. In some other places, they are crushed in small quantities at a time in shallow tubs, a tedious operation. The use of a " martyr " for the purpose is, perhaps, most general ; this is a wooden box, having a bottom formed of laths so closely eet that the grapes cannot pass between them. Into thia box, which is placed upon bulks above the vat, the grapes are thrown £1.8 they arrive, and ale crushed by a workman in sabots. The juice runs through into the vat, while the solid matters remain behind, to he subsequently withdrawn at the side, and either added to the must in the vat or not, as occasion may require. This is repeated till the vat is filled conveniently high. The pressing of the grapes is an absolute necessity, because the saccharine juicea will not ferment until liberated from the cella in which they are enclosed ; but there is no reason why the barbarous methods still existing ehould not be supplanted by machinery such as ie used for crushing sugar-cane.