On the chemical and microscopical analysis of an unsound wine / by Jas. R. Napier, F.R.S., and Professor J.G. M'Kendrick, M.D.

  • Napier, James R. (James Robert), 1812-1879.
Date:
[1878]
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the chemical and microscopical analysis of an unsound wine / by Jas. R. Napier, F.R.S., and Professor J.G. M'Kendrick, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    On the Chemical and Microscopical Analysis of an Unsound Wine. By Mr. Jas. R. Napier, F.R.S., and Professor J. G. M‘Kendrick, M.D. [Read before the Philosophical Society of Glasgow, January 23, 1878.] Mr. Jas. R. Napier gave an account of a purchase of wine he had made from a maker in Taormina, Sicily. According to the winemaker’s • statement “ it was a very fine and pure natural white wine, called Alcantara, perfectly pure, of exquisite flavour and perfume, and moderately dry. It had been heated, and all ferment perfectly destroyed, and the price for a quarter cask of about 23 gallons, free on board at Messina, would be <£7, 10s.” The Custom House duty on arrival in Glasgow having been charged at 2s. 6d. per gallon, instead of at the shilling duty of natural wine, led him to suspect that it was a fortified wine which had been sent to him, and not the natural wine ordered. He stated that the two analyses submitted, the one by Dr. Edward J. Mills, Glasgow, and the other by Dr. August Dupre, London, agreed in showing that the wine was neither pure nor natural—that at least from 6 to 8 per cent of proof spirit had been added. Dr. Mills says that there is a considerable amount of acetic ether present, and Dr. Dupr6, that the excessive amount of acetic ether proves the wine to be unsound, and in a condition in which it certainly ought not to have been sold. A remark of Pasteur’s in his “ Etudes sur le Yin” as to the parasites in unsound wine, led to Mr. Napier’s getting a microscopical analysis of the wine from Dr. M‘Kendrick of the Glasgow University. This showed that there were abund- ance of the Mycoderma aceti and the Mycoderma vini, as figured by Pasteur, present. Report on Alcantara Wine, by Dr. J. Mills, F.R.S., Professor of Technical Chemistry in Anderson!s College, Glasgow. I have examined the sample of wine which you handed me on May 24. The results are,—