The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1897-05-12

after the matter was thoroughly dis
cussed the members of the vineyard
company made up their minds to try.
So the redwood forests of Humboldt
County were called upon to supply the
necessary lumber.
The selection of lumber for the cask
was no ordinary task, for not more
than one stick in dozen of those pre-
sented for examination would do. At
last enough lumber of the very first
quality was found, and then the work
of drying it so that there would be not
the slightest danger of shrinkage be-
gan. 1t required just two years to
complete this task. The lumber ready,
two entire trains of cars proved neces-
sary to convey it to the nearest point
to the vineyard. This lumber was
amply sufficient in quantity to erect
such house as does not exist in Cali
fornia.
The hoops that bind the cask to-
gether are of finely tempered steel. In
the aggregate they would fill two large
freight cars and their total weight is
10000 pounds. The cask towers to a
height of thirty feet and is twenty-six
feet in diameter. If it's contents could
be placed in unbroken bulk in freight
cars it would take thirty of the biggest
to hold it,
There is only one cask in the world
which can be legitimately compared
with this giant of California, and that
is the great tun of Heidelberg, Ger
many. The California cask was not
constructed with the intention of out
doing any one, but simply for business
reasons. The difference in size of
these two tuns can best be understood
by considering the fact that the Ger
man cask holds $4,000 gallons and the
California cask $4,000, showing the
former to be less than half the size of
the latter.
Considering the contents of the cask
from the measurement of gallons, the
idea of it's immensity is not so fully
impressed as when figuring on basis
of lesser quantities. For instance, the
cask holds 3SS,000 quarts, or TIC, 900
pints, or 3,0O4, 900 gills. An ordinary
glass of wine is about third of gill,
perhaps little less. This huge cask
would hold a sufficient quantity to
permit 9,012,000 persons to partake of
a glass. Therefore, if every inhabi-
tant of the greatest five cities of the
United States should pass in process
sion before this huge redwood recep-
tacle each could take drink there
from.
Figuring the value of the contents
of the cask at the price it would be re-
tailed by the glass in the States where
wine is not made, the total reached is
1901, 200, so near million that it can,
without great stretching, be called a
million dollar cask.
Looking at the wine from still
another standpoint, quantity being al
ways the primal basis, the cssk con-
tains sufficient to fairly food quite a
section of the land about it should it
break, and the chances are it would
sweep along at first with sufficient
force to seriously affect small build
ings which might be in its pathway.
Certainly it would drown any human
being who happened to be in the way
OF the food. While the exact number
of tons of grapes whose juice is re-
quired to make enough wine to fill the
cask has never been estimated, the
proprietors of the vineyard say it would
run into hundreds of thousands Of
pounds. York Herald.