NIERSTEIN, Nov. 1 — The vineyard harvest is in, and in the musty cellars of dozens of wineries in the Rhinehessen area — heart of the Rhine wine country — the juice of the white grapes is gurgling as it ferments in enormous oak casks, carefully tended by expert kellermeisters.

The Rhinehessen wine area lies along the west bank of the Rhine, embraced in the long curve of the Rhine between Bingen and Worms, where every slope is a vineyard and the raising of wine grapes is the keystone of the local economy.

The cultivation of grapes for fine wines is a job requiring skill and long experience. One of the oldest firms, which has been producing high quality Rhine wines since 1824, is the Weingut Louis Guntrum, which has the winery in this river-edge town and its acres of vineyards throughout the surrounding countryside.

Last week the Guntrum pickers — whole families of villagers — marched singing behind the last wagonload of grapes from the 1947 crop and stood in a semicircle, singing a thanksgiving hymn as the grapes were ladled from a vast tub into the pressing machine.

There are other traditions in the vineyards, all dating back centuries and still rigidly observed. Nearly always, some member of the owner's family remains with the pickers in the vineyard during the harvesting — not as a supervisor, but as a helper. It is the duty of the owner's wife to follow after the pickers and gather in bunches of grapes they have overlooked.

Visitors to the vineyard are always "stumped" — tossed three times in the air from a picker's apron. This custom dates back to the time when women pickers had concealed pockets in the voluminous derrieres of their peasant dress, and concealed grapes in them as they worked. The blanket-tossing was designed to render the stolen grapes into a pulp ahead of schedule.

The slightest variation in soil, angle of sunlight or degree of slope will have its ultimate effect on the flavor or quality of the wines. Consequently the vineyards are divided into small parcels, and grapes from each small area are kept separate throughout the entire wine-making process. Their identity will later appear on the label. The time of picking, too, affects the quality. The best Rhine wines are usually designated as "spatlese," late picked "auslese," a special selection of bunches of overripe grapes, or "beeren auslese," specially selected ripe berries picked grape-by-grape for their sweetness, rather than in bunches.

The Guntrum firm produces about a quarter-million bottles of top quality wines each year, and before the war shipped them to 36 countries. Today their entire output is controlled by the French occupation authorities, but they are awaiting licenses to begin exports to the U. S. A 40,000-liter cask is already set aside for shipment to New York as soon as clearance is received.

The '47 wines will not be a vintage quality because of the drought, but will be of low acidity and high alcoholic content. Best vintage years since the famous 1921 wines were 1934, 1937, 1943, 1945 and 1946.

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