1919 Home made beverages

Beverages — A Icoholic glass manufacturer liberally for them, and some nine makers give orders for as many as from 50,000 to 20^,000' at a time. The bottles as they arrive are examined by an experi- enced person, and those which contain flaws of a#y kind, or are not perfectly new, symmetrical and strong, are rejected. These average about 10%. The bottles are required to be as nearly as possible of uniform weight and thickness. The inside of each bottle is scrubbed by means of a revolving hair brush and clean water. After being drained, the bottles are rinsed with 90% alcohol and closed with an old but clean cork. They are thus ready, when required, for filling. The wine maker also expends a large amount of money in the purchase of corks, which must be of the best and soundest description. It has been found to be very false economy to use inferior kinds. The wine being drawn into bottles to a height of 2 or 3 inches from the top of the neck, the bottles have next to be corked, the cork being secured in the bottle by a small iron band, called an agrafe. All these operations have to be performed deftly and rapidly by experienced workmen. With what speed they are accomplished may be imagined from the fact that an atelier of 5 workmen, who divide the labor, will bottle and cork from 1,200 to 1,500 bottles daily, 2 bottles passing through all hands in 1 minute. The corking, etc., finished, the bottles are next placed on their sides and stacked in cellars or caves, each stack being sup- ported by thin laths. As the summer approaches, the wine begins to show signs of fermentation, which increases with the hot weather. When the fermentation reaches such a stage as to cause the wine to occupy the previously unfilled space in the neck of the bottle, a large number of bottles begin to burst, as well as to leak; and in some years as much as 30% of the wine is lost from these causes. Two courses, each of which requires to be promptly adopted, are open to the wine maker under these circumstances. Either he must remove the wine to a cooler cellar or uncork the 152