The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1891-07-24
THE LIQUORS OF FRANCE.
How They Are Now Made from Barley
and Various Chemicals.


and Various Chemicals.
The English consul resident at
Nantes, France, has sent to his govern
ment a report of the wine manufacture
and trade in his own and several other
districts, which will be read with in
terest wherever French wines and
brandy are drank or supposed to be
drank
AS to cognac, with a toothful of
which the gourmet loves to round off
and compose a generous dinner, Consul
Pauncefote reminds Englishmen that
it cannot be procured for less than
one pound sterling Give dollars per
bottle, and that anything sold at a
smaller figure is not an agricultural,
but an industrial product" into whose
composition if real cognac enters at all
it enters only ''as perfume, to the eX-
tent that eau-de-cologne is put on a
handkerchief.
In reference to wines also, both
white and red, the account which he
has to transmit is not whit more en-
couraging In the case of wine used
for drinking, he says, the art of max
ing it from materials other than grapes
has advanced to quite high degree of
perfection. Red wine is made of white
ing and a little coloring matter, while
white wine is made of barley.
This bogus or imitation wine manu-
facture is due IN large measure it is
peculiar to say, to one of Pasteur's eel
ebrated discoveries. In the course of
that renowned scientists experiments
in fermentation, he unearthed the fact,
not known before, that the bouquet of
a fermented liquor is due not to the
material of which it is made, but to the
yeast that is used in its fermentation
He showed by actual experiment that
wine could be made of barley; and that
if the yeast used for fermenting pur-
poses were the yeast of a particular
grape, Chablis or Yquem, for example.
the wine would be Chablis or Yquem
without a suspicion of barley flavor.
The discovery of Pasteurs, Consul
Pauncefote tells US, has been worked
for commercial purposes with singular
success, particularly by one M. George
.Jacquemin. This enterprising vinous
artist, it seems, has surpassed not only
all previous artists in this line, in the
beauty and variety of his vinous inven-
tions, but he has even gone point be-
yond that at which Pasteur himself ar
rived in the discovery referred to above
For Pasteur, while he manufactured
wine from barley, always useG the ac-
tual yeast or BARN obtained from real
grapes of that particular vintage which
he sought to produce, nor indeed did he
ever give a hint that such modest
tribute to genuineness could under any
circumstances be dispensed with. But
the entcrprising NJ. Jacquemin event
one better" than the scientist; the
scientist required genuine grape yeast
for fermentation to produce the desired
wine, NJ. Jacquemin dispenses also
with real yeast. He has invented and
uses an artificial BARN, made from
chemicals only, wherewith he initiates
the flavors of all the finest vintages
to such perfection as to defy detection
even from the connoisseur.
And, finally, this successful winter
has carried his discoveries to the point
of finding out that, if the wines which
he has so manufactured be distilled,
the product will be a brandy of excel
lent quality, with all the flavor of the
particular grape ferment used in the
manufacture of the wine. "a s.-, -
These are facts which wine bibbers
and brandy topers will no doubt ru-
inmate upon with mixed feelings They
will console themselves to some extent
probably with the reflection that there
is nothing more deleterious than a little
alum in the fabricated wines which
they have been drinking, believing
them to be pure and genuine; while
they will no doubt:deplore the tendency
TO sham that, there is. in everything
made nowadays, and join with the
ecclesiast of old in lamenting that,
while the'Creator made them upright,
they have sought. out many inven-
TONS But knowledge of the fact
that most of the brands of cheap French
wines now on the market areinnocent of
any connection with the genuine grape,
coupled with the further fact that there
was more champagne" said to be con-
sumed in the United States of America
in the year. of grace 1890 than was
grown in all the vineyards of Cham
payne, ought to furnish material for
serious reflection to wine and brandy
drinkers, here and elsewhere.-N o.
IAmeS-Democrat. ~, 81 :, ;.'.,r