WINE SWINDLES

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVI, Issue 43065, 5 March 1907, Page 1

WINE SWINDLES

FRAUD AND EXTORTION (Continued from last issue). From what are these wines made? Some times from the commonest, cheapest raisins, which are so bad that no grocer would dream of stocking them. But oft'ener they are made from grape must whioh comes into this country duty free. Suga is added, and it: iss fermented,r and the resultant product, treated with chemicals and dye, is “wine.” Hitherto this has not paid duty, but a clause was inserted in the Finance Act this year provided that the manufacturers of these “wines” shall pay a license of <£l a ridiculous sum- so that there premises shall be open to Inspection for the purpose of examining the materials they use, and of testing the alcoholic strength of the liquor they produce. SEASIDE “WINES.”

Much of this wine, I am. told, goes into the cellars of wateringplace hotels, and this I can well believe, judging fr t) m some late experiences of my own. The other day, in a large hotel, I asked for a bottle of claret —“St. Julien, 1893.” It came, uncorked. I tasted it. It was absolutely undrinkable by any man with the slighest knowledge of real claret. Yet the genuine

I wine of 1893 is one of the best |in existence, the vintage being 1 superb. On another day and in another hotel of good repute I asked for a Moselle, “Berncastler Doctor.” It was a fraud of the most barefaced kind. It -refused in each case to pay for what I could not drink, and in each case was told my luggage would be detained until I did. I said, “All right. Give me the wine I have left, and the case shall go into court.??; Tha‘, settled it, and I was no longer interfered may just say the prices charged werfev. more than" what I ought to have been asked for the genuine article. -

There is no excuse whatever for the high charges for wine in hotels. A pure, genuiue claret-may be bought for 13s a dozen, and for' 20s to 24s a really fine wine may be obtained. Yet the hotel-keeper charges from 4s Jo 5s for a bottle of rubbish. . . .