In Vino Veritas - A Book about Wine Book

IN VINO VERITAS IN VINO VERITAS A BOOK ABOUT WINE - CONTENTS - CHAPTER PAGE I. THE WINE TRADE OF ENGLAND 5 11. THE VINEYARDS OF THE WORLD - 54 111. THE VINE AND ITS FRUIT - - 95 IV THE ART OF WINE-MAKING - - 115 THE ART OF DISIILLATION - - 141 VI. ALCOHOL AND THE HUMAN BODY - 174 INTRODUCTION Addressing a meeting of total abstainers, at Manchester, a short time ago, the Bishop of Lincoln deplored the fact that teetotalism was making no headway. The common sense of the race is asserting itself and condemns with equal justice all excesses intemperance in drink is universally deprecated and the intemperance in speech and statement of total abstinence advocates, whose antagonism to alcohol has fossilised into superstition, is equally condemned by all sober-minded people. The immense majority of brain-workers, in this as in all other civilised countries, drink wines and spirits, and there must be many who would like to know something more reliable about alcohol than what is to be found in the numerous publications issued by total abstinence associations. There has not been any comprehensive work upon wines and spirits published in England for many years, and the Committee of the Wine Trade Club have decided to issue a series of text-books to supply the public as well as winemerchants with authentic facts and figures about wines and spirits. The present volume is the first of these text-books it consists of six chapters which correspond to the six lectures delivered by the Wine Trade Club at Vintners Hall during the winter of 1911-1912. It may be said to form an introduction to the study of the subject it contains a strictly correct but very short description of the history of the wine trade in England and general information on the growing of vines, the art of wine-making, the science of distillation and the effects of alcohol upon the human body. Some will be satisfied with the superficial knowledge gained from the following pages, but many more may be induced thereby to take a keener interest than hitherto into a branch of. commerce the study of which offers a larger and more varied field of research than any other. The next volumes will deal exhaustively with the different wines of the world at the historical and technical points of view. One volume of the series will deal with the botanical, scientific, chemical, medical, and political aspects of the question, whilst another volume will be entirely devoted to spirits. A. L. S. Chvistmas, 1912. CHAPTER I The Wine Trade of England Past and Present THERE is no trade in the land of greater antiquity than the Wine Trade, nor can any other branch of commerce claim to possess greater or wider interest. The Romans, during their occupation of Britain, probably imported some wine for their own use, but they never introduced viticulture in the country, nor can they be said to have established a regular trade in wines between England and the Continent. The use of wine and the knowledge of I viticulture in England are coeval with the introduction of the Christian faith. In nearly eSery Eastern and Continental province of the Roman Empire, vines were cultivated and wine was easy to procure not so, however, in Britain, and there is no doubt that wine was imported regularly by the first Christian priests who obtained a sufficiently secure footing in this country and were able to build a church or monastery as a permanent abode. These early missionaries kept as close a connection as the times permitted with the larger and wealthier churches already flourishing in Gaul they were, in many instances, the offshoots of these Continental missions, which supplied them with the clothing and the wine necessary to carry on their ministry, as well as with spiritual guidance...Read More