“There’s lime in the sack!” is a sentence put into the mouth of Falstaff. In modern days the process has become known as “plastering,” from the fact that plaster-of-Paris consists principally of sulphate of lime or burnt gypsum.
“It is interesting,” says the Lancet, “to surmise the origin of this very ancient custom. That it had some intelligent basis admits of no doubt. Some think that it had its origin in the fact being noticed that when the grape juice was fermented in alabaster vessels or in marble tanks the wine was better, it clarified quicker, and {145} developed character more satisfactorily. Others regard the addition of sulphate of lime as convenient from a mechanical point of view during the pressing; it was necessary when the grapes were wetter than usual in order to bind the residuary mass together. We do not incline to this view.”
As the Lancet devotes a considerable space to the exposition of the view to which it does incline I may be excused from quoting it in full—more especially as there be tables of percentages, and complicated mathematical calculations in said exposition. But it is proved to the satisfaction of the Lancet that “lime in the sack” is matter in the right place. And although to an uneducated mind lime suggests such terrifying developments of tarda podagra as chalk-stones, possibly the action of the grapes on the lime renders it innocuous.
It is a curious fact that sherry in keeping develops a slight increase of alcohol as the time advances. All spirit added to sherry, however, is obtained from wine itself, corn-spirit in Spain being quite a superfluity, since wine-spirit can be produced so cheaply and in unlimited quantity. Moreover the importation of German spirit into Spain is made practically impossible by a prohibitive duty. Still, unless rumour lies, some Spanish wines receive the German spirit after exportation; so Spain “gets there just the same.”
Here is an item of news which should inspire confidence in the sceptic.
“Good brandy—i.e. a genuine wine-distilled {146} spirit—is being produced in Spain in commercial quantities which it is to be hoped will successfully compete with the stuff erroneously called brandy, not to say Cognac, but of which not a drop has been derived from the grape.”
In my researches into the manufacture of port and sherry, I have come across no mention of the phylloxera. I am, therefore, halting between the beliefs, either that the Spaniards and Portuguese understand vermin better than do the French, or that the “vine-louse” has her own reasons for keeping out of Spain and Portugal.
Forty years ago an estimable Irish nobleman was known as “Old Sherry,” from his partiality to that wine. And thirty years ago I was once seated at the table of a General of Division, up at Simla. My right-hand neighbour was a son of this same nobleman, but our host, apparently, did not know this—or had forgotten the fact. At all events, during a lull in the conversation, the General (who had a voice like sharpening a saw) rapped out: “By the way, Captains—you say you’ve been quartered in Ireland—did you ever meet ‘Old Sherry’ there?”
A subaltern can’t very well throw a dinner-roll at a General or stick a carving-fork into his leg; but that is what I, personally, felt like doing.
In mediæval times a sufficient quantity of wine for the needs of the inhabitants was made in gallant little Wales; and the idea of reviving the industry occurred to the Marquis of Bute, who has done so much for the welfare of Cardiff {147} and the neighbourhood. The vineyards are on the site of the old ones, facing south, and the vines were planted twenty years ago, and are very hardy. There is no reason why they should not be propagated to almost any extent, and there is abundant scope for the extension of the vineyards and a proportionate increase in the yield of wine.