1876 Facts About Sherry by Henry Vizetelly

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Facts about Sherry.

trifleoverasMUiagaday,wiiile the menemployedatthepressesget half as much again. The value of an acre of vineyard of alhariza SOU in the MorUcs district is .£60; vineyards less favom-ably situated being-worth aboutone-third of thatamountand upwards per acre. In the best vineyards only a single butt of wine per acre is calcrUated upon, whereas the commoner soUs -will readUy yield a couple of butts. The finer grapes are not sold bythe growers,but are made by them into -wine; inferior grapes, however,can be bought in any quantity at the rate of 251bs.for lOd. The latter are pressed at the bodegas in the to-wn, and much of the wine yielded by them goes to Malaga,whereas all the finest Montilla finds its way to Jerez. The-wine is preferred by certain shippers there because it enjoys the reputation of ripening a couple of years earlier than the Jerez gro-wths. Inthe neighbourhood of MontiUathere are other considerable "wine-gro-wing districts whose produce isinsome repute,although it falls far short of first-class MontiUa. These are AguUar, Monturque,Cabra,and Lucena,the latter being by far the most important. It is here,by the way,that those capacious earthen ware jars called tinajas are made. These pages may be fitly closed with a few remarks,the result of a lengthened study under especiaUy favourable circum stances of numerous -wines, produced not onlyfrom very difi'erent soUs, but from -widely different species of grapes; and all of which are shipped to England mider the generic name of sherry. I have already sho-wn that the smaU quantity of gypsum used in making these wines is productive of no harmful result. That it converts certain tartrates into sulphates is true enough; but if any one imagines that it does this to the extent of changing the flavour of the -wine in the smallest degree, or that sherry, fermented -without having had gypsum added to it, possessesany of that fresh acidulous flavour which sound judges so much admire in -wines of more northern latitudes, he is greatly mis taken. I have frequently compared wines from the same vine yard made with and -without gypsum,and have been unable to