OF THE CRIMEA.
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for a ruble and a half, or frorn one hundred and fifty to onehundred and eighty kopeeks. The wines of Koos and Toklukgenerally produce twenty kopeeks lefs than the former: andthofe of Taraktafh and Katiha are about one-third cheaper.The infipid wines of Kutlak and of the Alma, which arefcarcely potable, when kept tili the month of May in the fol-lowing year, are now fold at from fixty to feventy kopeeks theEimer; becaufe they may be purchafed earlier in autumn, andare more fpeedily clarified ; the whole flock of thefe liquorsbeing in general exhaufted before the return of fpring.—Formerly, the Tartars prepared large quantities of Bekme/s, ormarmalade, and MiJJelefs^ or fyrup, from their grapes. Butthe fale of the wine and fruit is at prefent found to be more pro-fitable ; and almoft every proprietor has begun to diftil brandyfrom the lees, which are fuffered to ferment in vats, or inpits well covered and plaiftered with clay: the lees, obtainedfrom one hundred Eimers of wine, generally yield four Eimersof brandy.
With a view to afFord due encouragement to the cultivationof the vine in Crim-Tartary, and in other fouthern provincesof Ruffia, not only an increafe of population is necefiary; but'alfo the foreign Wines (which are partly imported through the'harbours of the Black Sea, and partly from Moldavia, by the 1Dnieftr) fhould, for feveral fucceflive years, be chärged with'higher duties, in order to raife the price of native wines, antfto enable the land-owners to plant new vineyardö; as theyrequire to be cultivated and tended for at leaft five years, beforethey yield the fmalleft profit to the proprietor. By fuchmeans, I am convinced, that, in the courfe-of. fifteen pr
twenty