The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-06-03
DISTRESS Of THE
WINE growers
0verproductlon and AduItera-
ton Has Brought Poverty
to Many Thousands.
GREAT 0UTCRY IN FRANCE
MORE WHEAT AND LESS GRAPES
THE REMEDY.

Paris. June 1.-The general and pro-
found distress which has overtaken the
wine growers of France, reducing some
regions to a pitiable conditions of pow
erty, is due to a variety of causes,
but chiefly to overproduction and con-
sequent low prices. The result has
been agitation on the part of the wine
growers for the complete suppression
of manufactured wine sold in competi-
ton With the natural product. The
great popular dem onstrations recently
held at Bezeirs and Perpignan had this
as their direct object.
The beginning of the trouble dates
back to thirty years ago, when two
thirds of the vineyards of France were
ravased and practically destroyed by
the phylloxera This scourge, it was
found. attacked only degenerate plants
eEfeebled by decades if not centuries
Of growth. The strong, vigorous Amer
lean plant was immune, and it was
used universally in repIanting the vine
yards. the French varieties of grapes
being successfully grated on the Amer
lean roots.
Resorted to AduIteration.
During the period of renewal, how
ever, from 1876 to 1888. the production
of natural wine " Us largely below con-
sumption. The south of France, for
instance, furnished only about half of
the $4,000 900 hectolitres consumed. Re
sort asNnaturally had to adulteration,
which first took the 4orm of re-enforc-
ing the third wine DRESSINGS with al
cohol and other chemicals.
Fraudulent wine was at that time
deemed a sort Of public benefaction, as
it enabled the poorer classes accus-
toned to the beverage to obtain it at
a reasonable price. But the deficit In
the natural product, besides inducing
the planting of an immense area of
new vineyards hitherto devoted to
cereals, etc, Leo to various expediants
for increasing the yield of the vine.
The most effective means was ascer-
tanned to be the suhmerging of the vine
yards in the low valleys during por-
ton of the season. This method pro-
dueed colossal results
Prices Forced Down.
A hectare which formerly yielded
from thirty 10 fifty hectolitres (the
normal production of hillside vine
yards), was made to produce 200 hecto-
litres. Overproduction and fraudulent
wines then steadily beared prices I'M
til after the enormous crops of 1899 and
1900 it fell at one time to francs a
hectoiitre, as against a normal price
of from 20 to 80. This crisis was fol-
lowed in the northern districts by the
growth of manufacture of wire from
sugar and chemicals, and when the
price of sugar fell, after the denuncia-
tion of the Brussels agreement in 1908,
the growers themselves were in the
business of adulteration by the whole
sale.
Quit Usinu Wine.
The Temps printed a table giving the
names of scores of communes where the
output of wine exceeded two and three
fold the quantity Of grapes grown. One
district threw 15,470,000 hectolitres on
the market. The amount of spurious
wine sold also had the effect of re-
ducing consumption and the substitu-
ton of beer among the working classes. |
found it deleterious and
among the common people the first !
was always against the use |
Of wine Among the middle classes it (
led to the general increase of total alb !
stinence and today there are thousands |
Of French families who seldom or never
have wine upon their tables, where |
as twenty years ago the drinking of |
wine was universal. 1t is estimated |
that half million people in Paris do /
not drink wine
Must Raise Other Crops.