None of the plots are fenced, and before the
grapes are sufficiently ripe for pressing they are stolen in large
quantities, or destroyed by cattle, goats, mules, and every stray animal
that is attracted to the fields. The owner of the vineyard accordingly
gathers his crop by degrees, a little before the proper time, and the
grapes are exposed upon the house-tops to ripen artificially in the sun.
In this manner the quality is seriously damaged; but the natives will
not acknowledge it any more than the Devonshire farmers, who leave their
apples in heaps upon the ground for many weeks, rotting and wasp-eaten,
before they are carried to the pound for the grinding of cider. The
grapes, having been trodden by men with large boots, are pressed, and
the juice of the commanderia is placed in jars capable of holding from
seventy to one hundred gallons. The refuse of skins and stalks is laid
upon one side to ferment for the manufacture of raki, or spirit, by
distillation. The fermentation of the juice proceeds in the earthen
jars, and is guided according to the ideas of the proprietor; when he
considers that it has continued to a degree sufficient for the strength
and quality of the wine, it is checked by the addition of powdered
gypsum. Here is one of the patent errors of the manufacture of
commanderia as a wine suitable to English tastes. The grape-juice is
naturally so rich in saccharine, that it is luscious and vapid to an
excess; this superabundant amount of sugar would be converted into
alcohol in the natural process of fermentation if unchecked, and by the
chemical change the wine would gain in strength and lose in sweetness.
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