“DRINKS”

Drinks
of the
World

BY
JAMES MEW,
Author of “Types from Spanish Story,” &c., &c.,
AND
JOHN ASHTON,
Author of “Social Life in the Reign of Queen Anne,” &c., &c.

ONE HUNDRED ILLUSTRATIONS.

1892.

LONDON:
The Leadenhall Press, 50, Leadenhall Street, E.C.
Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Co., Ltd.

NEW YORK: Scribner & Welford.

“Ingeniosa Sitis.”—Martial, Epig. xiv. 117.

“J’y ai songé comme un autre, et je suis tenté de mettre l’appétence des liqueurs fermentées, qui n’est pas connue des animaux, à côté de l’inquiétude de l’avenir, qui leur est étrangère, et de les regarder l’une et l’autre comme des attributs distinctifs du chef-d’œuvre de la dernière révolution sublunaire.”—Brillat-Savarin, Physiologie du Goût, Medit. 9.

“Ac si quis diligenter reputet, in nulla parte operosior vita est, ceu non saluberrimum ad potum aquæ liquorem natura dederit, quo cætera omnia animantia utuntur.”—Pliny, Nat. Hist. xiv. 28.

“Wine that maketh glad the heart of man.”—Ps. civ. 15.

INDEX.

“DRINKS”

Dedicated to those who know how to use and thankfully enjoy the good things so bountifully provided by Dame Nature.

Introduction.

From the Cradle to the Grave we need Drink, and we have not far to look for the reason, when we consider that at least seventy per cent. of the human body is composed of water, to compensate the perpetual waste of which, a fresh supply is, of course, absolutely necessary. This is taken with our food (all solid nutriment containing some water), and by the drink we consume. But, as the largest constituent part of the body is fluid, so, naturally, its waste is larger than that of the solid; this fluid waste being enormous. Besides the natural losses, every breath we exhale is heavily laden with moisture, as breathing on a cold polished surface, or a cold day by condensing the breath, will show; whilst the twenty-eight miles of tubing disposed over the surface of the human body will evaporate, invisibly, two or three pounds of water daily. Of course, in very hot weather, or after extreme exertion, this perspiration is much more, and is visible.

To remedy this loss we must drink, as a stoppage of the supply would kill sooner than if solid food were withheld, for then the body would, for a time, live upon its own substance, as in the cases of the fasting men of the last two years; but few people can live longer than three days without drinking, and death by thirst is looked upon as one of the most cruel forms of dissolution. To palliate thirst, however, it is not absolutely necessary to drink, as a moist atmosphere or copious bathing will do much towards allaying it,—the one by introducing moisture into the system by means of the lungs, the other through the medium of the skin.

Thirst is the notice given by Nature that liquid aliment is required to repair the waste of the body; and, as in the case of Hunger, she has kindly provided that supplying the deficiency shall be a pleasant sensation, and one calculated to call up a feeling of gratitude for the means of allaying the want. Indeed, no man knows the real pleasures of eating and drinking, until he has suffered both hunger and thirst.

Water, as a means of slaking man’s thirst, has been provided for him in abundance from the time of Father Adam, whose “Ale” is so vaunted by abstainers from alcoholic liquors. But Water, unless charged with Carbonic Acid gas, or containing some mineral in solution, is considered by some, as a constant drink, rather vapid; and Man, as he became civilized, has made himself other beverages, more or less tasty, and provocative of excess, and also more or less deleterious to his internal economy. The juice of luscious fruits was expressed, the vine was made to give up its life blood; and, probably through accident, alcoholic fermentation was discovered, and a new zest was given to drinking. A good servant, Alcohol is a bad master; but that it satisfies a widely felt craving, probably induced by civilization, is certain, for most savage tribes, emerging from their primitive and natural state, manufacture drinks from divers vegetable substances, more or less alcoholic.

The present volume is intended for that class of the public which is known as “the general reader”; and its object is to interest rather than to inform. Therefore it deals at no great length with what may be termed the caviare of the subject, as, for instance, the varied opinions of the medical faculty with respect to the hygienic value of drinks, their supposed uses in health and disease, and their chemical constituents, or analyses. Nor is the question of price discussed, nor long lists of vineyard proprietors given, nor the names of the brewers, nor the number of casks of beer brewed. In short, as few statistics have been introduced as possible. In deference to a maxim not always remembered in books on beverages, “De gustibus non est disputandum,” or its English equivalent, abhorred of Chesterfield, “What is one man’s meat is another man’s poison,” the verdicts of enthusiasts and vendors have been, except in rare instances, alike rejected.

Nor has very much been said on the inviting topic of adulteration. It would be almost cruel to disturb the credulity of the good people who drink and pay for gooseberry as Champagne, or Val de peñas as curious old Port. It is a pretty comedy to watch the soi-disant connoisseur drinking a wine fully accredited with crust, out of a bottle ornamented with fungus and cobwebs of proper consistency—a wine flavoured with essence at so much a pound, and stained with colour[1] at so much per gallon. There is no need to proclaim upon the housetops the constituents of Hamburg sherry, nor how the best rum is flavoured with “R.E.,” or brandy with “Caramel” or “Cognacine.”

We have generally avoided the profane use of trade or professional jargon, too often the outcome of ignorance, pretence, and affectation, such as “full,” “fruity,” “smooth on palate,” “round in the mouth,” “full of body,” “wing,” “character,” etc.; nor have we touched, or desired to touch, on the influence of alcohol on man’s social or other well-being. Peter the Hermit is fully represented already, and we have no mission to call upon our fellow-countrymen to “rise to the dignity of manhood,” and never touch another glass of Madeira.

The authors have followed the example of the illustrious Molière in taking their matter wherever they could find it. The information contained in this work is derived either from other books, oral information, or personal experience. “The sun robs the sea, the moon robs the sun, the sea robs the moon,” says Timon of Athens, repeating Anacreon, who adds that the earth robs them all. So preceding authors are indebted to one another, and the present volume to them all. It has been written, it is hoped, without bias or prejudice of any kind; but, as the drinks containing Alcohol are many more than those in which it is absent, more have been mentioned. That a full record of all drinks should appear, is impossible; nor could any critic expect it; but an attempt has been made to give a fairly full list, and to render it as pleasant reading as the subject admits.

THE DRINKS OF ANTIQUITY.

Egypt: Method of Wine-Making—Early Wines—Names of Wines—Ladies and Wine—Beer, etc. Assyria: List of Assur-ba-ni-pal’s Wines—Method of Drinking—Different Sorts of Wine. Hittite: Two Ladies Drinking—Their Appreciation of Wine—The Hittite Bacchus. Judea: Mention of Wines in the Old Testament—Wine as an Article of Commerce—Mixed Wines—Wine Vessels.

Has any man been bold enough to attempt to fix upon the discoverer of Wine? Not to our knowledge. Nor can a date be even hazarded as to its introduction. It was so good a thing, that we may be sure that men very soon came to know its revivifying effects. We do know this: that the oldest records of which we have any cognisance, those of the Egyptians (who were in a high state of civilization and culture when the Hebrews were semi-barbarous nomads), show us that they had wine, and used it in a most refined manner, as we see by the headpiece to this chapter. Here a father is nursing his child, who invites him to smell a lotus flower, another blossom of which his mother is showing him. An attendant proffers wine in bowls wreathed with flowers, and another is at hand with a bowl possibly of water, and a napkin. This wreathing the bowls with flowers shows how highly they esteemed the “good creature,” and, also, that they were then at least as civilized as the later Greeks and Romans, who followed the same practice.

We have the Egyptian pictures showing the whole process of wine-making. We see their vines very carefully trained in bowers, or in avenues, formed by columns and rafters; their vineyards were walled in, and frequently had a reservoir of water within their precincts, together with a building which contained a winepress; whilst boys frightened the birds away with slings and stones, and cries. The grapes, when gathered, were put into deep wicker baskets, which men carried either on their heads or shoulders, or slung upon a yoke, to the winepress, where the wine was squeezed out of a bag by means of two poles turned in contrary directions, an earthen pan receiving the juice. But they also had large presses, in which they trod the fruit with their naked feet, supporting themselves by ropes suspended from the roof.

The grape juice having fermented, it was put into earthen jars, resembling the Roman amphoræ, which were closed with a lid covered with pitch, clay, mortar or gypsum, and sealed, after which they were removed to the storehouse, and there placed upright. The Egyptians had a peculiar habit, which used also to be general in Italy and Greece, and now obtains in the islands of the Archipelago, of putting a certain quantity of resin or bitumen at the bottom of the amphora before pouring in the wine. This was supposed to preserve it, but it was also added to give it a flavour—a taste probably acquired from their having been used to wine skins, instead of jars, and having employed resins to preserve the skins.

The Egyptians had several kinds of wine, even as early as the fourth dynasty (above 6000 years ago, according to Mariette), when four kinds of wine, at least, were known. Pliny and Horace say that the wine of Mareotis was most esteemed. The soil, which lay beyond the reach of the alluvial deposits, suited the vine, and extensive remains of vineyards near the Qasr Karóon, still found, show whence the ancient Egyptians obtained their wines. Athenæus says, “the Mareotic grape was remarkable for its sweetness;” and he thus describes the wine made therefrom: “Its colour is white, its quality excellent, and it is sweet and light, with a fragrant bouquet; it is by no means astringent, nor does it affect the head.... Still, however, it is inferior to the Teniotic, a wine which receives its name from a place called Tenia, where it is produced. Its colour is pale and white, and there is such a degree of richness in it, that, when mixed with water, it seems gradually to be diluted, much in the same way as Attic honey when a liquid is poured into it; and besides the agreeable flavour of the wine, its fragrance is so delightful as to render it perfectly aromatic, and it has the property of being slightly astringent. There are many other vineyards in the valley of the Nile, whose wines are in great repute, and these differ both in colour and taste; but that which is produced about Anthylla is preferred to all the rest.” He also commends some of the wines made in the Thebaïd, especially about Coptos, and says that they were “so wholesome that invalids might take them without inconvenience, even during a fever.”

Pliny cites the Sebennytic wine as one of the choice Egyptian crûs, and says it was made of three different sorts of grapes. He also speaks of a curious wine called Ecbolada.

Wine took a large part in the Egyptian ritual, and was freely poured forth as libations to the different deities; and in private life women were not restricted in its use. In fact, the ungallant Egyptians have left behind them several delineations of ladies in a decided state of “how came you so?” It was probably put down to the Egyptian equivalent for Salmon.[2] But if they noticed the failings of their womankind, they equally faithfully portrayed their own shortcomings, for we see them being carried home from a feast limp and helpless, or else standing on their heads, and otherwise playing the fool.

Still, wine was the drink of the wealthy, or at least of those, as we should call them, “well to do.” They had a beer, which Diodorus calls zythum,[3] and which, he says, was scarcely inferior to the juice of the grape. This beer was made from barley, and, hops being unknown, it was flavoured with lupins and other vegetable substances. This old beer was called hega, and can be traced back as far as the 4th dynasty. Then they also had Palm wine, and another wine called baga, supposed to be made from dates or figs; and they also made wines from pomegranates and other fruits, and from herbs, such as rue, hellebore, absinthe, etc., which probably answered the purpose of our modern “bitters.”

The Assyrians, who rank next in antiquity to the Egyptians, were no shunners of wine; they could drink sociably, and hob-nob together, as we see by the accompanying illustration.

Their wine cups were, in keeping with all the dress and furniture of the royal palaces, exceedingly ornate; and it is curious to note the comparative barbarism of the wine skin, and the nervous beauty of the wine cups being filled by the effeminate eunuch. The numerous bas-reliefs which, happily, have been rescued, to our great edification, afford many examples of wine cups of very great beauty of form. The inscriptions give us a list of many wines, and among them was the wine of Helbon, which was grown near Damascus, at a village now called Halbûn. It is alluded to in Ezekiel xxvii. 18: “Damascus was thy merchant, by reason of the multitude of the wares of thy making, for the multitude of all riches; in the wine of Helbon, and white wool.”

Wm. St. Chad Boscawen, Esq., the eminent Assyriologist, has kindly favoured us with the following illustration and note on the subject of Assyrian wines:—

“This list of wines is found engraved upon a terra-cotta tablet from the palace of Assur-ba-ni-pal, the Sardanapalus of the Greeks, and evidently represents the wines supplied to the royal table. It reads:

Col. I. Wine of the Land of Izalli.
Wine, the Drink of the King (Daniel i. 5).
Wine of the Nazahrie.
Wine of Ra-h-ū (Shepherds’ Wine).
Wine of Khabaru.
Col. II. Wine of Khilbunn or Helbon.
Wine of Arnabani (North Syria).
Wine of Sibzu (Sweet Wine).
Wine of Sa-ta-ba-bi-ru-ri (which I think means Wines which from the Vineyard come not).
Wine of Kharrubi (Wine of the Carrob or Locust bean).”

On Phillips’s Cylinder (col. i. l. 21-26) is a list of wines which Nabuchodorossor is said to have offered: “The wine of the countries of Izalla, Toúimmon, Ssmmini, Helbon, Aranaban, Souha, Bit-Koubati, and Bigati, as the waters of rivers without number.” And among the inscriptions deciphered appear a long list of wines which the Assyrian monarchs are said to have carried into their country as booty, or to have received as tribute.

We see the process of filling the wine cups at a feast. They were dipped into a large vase instead of being filled from a small vessel. Nor were they alone contented with grape wine, they had palm wine, wine made from dates, and beer even as the Egyptians had.

According to the Abodah Zarah, a treatise on false worship, there was a mixed drink used in Babylon called Cuttach, which possessed marvellous properties. “It obstructs the heart, blinds the eyes, and emaciates the body. It obstructs the heart, because it contains whey of milk; it blinds the eyes, because it contains a peculiar salt which has this property; and it emaciates the body, because of the putrefied bread which is mixed with it. If poured upon stones, it breaks them; and of it is a proverb, ‘That it is better to eat a stinking fish than take Cuttach.’” The same treatise also mentions Median beer and Edomite vinegar.

The Hittites had been a powerful and civilized nation when the Jews were in an exceedingly primitive condition, and Abraham found them the rightful possessors of Hebron, in Southern Palestine (Gen. xxiii.), and so far recognised their rights to the soil, as to purchase from them the Cave of Machpelah for “four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant.” Their power afterwards waned, as they had left Hebron and taken to the mountains, as was reported by the spies sent by Moses, four hundred years afterwards (Num. xiii.), but they have left behind them carvings which throw some light upon their social customs. For instance, here is one of two ladies partaking of a social glass together. Unfortunately, we do not know at present the true meaning of their inscriptions, for scholars are yet at variance as to the translation of them. That they thoroughly cherished wine may be seen from the accompanying illustration, which represents one of their deities, who appears to be a compound of Bacchus and Ceres, and aptly illustrative of the two good things of those countries, corn and wine, which, with the olive and honey, made an earthly Paradise for the inhabitants thereof. It shows how much they appreciated wine, when they deified it.

As to the Hebrews, they were well acquainted with wine, and placed Noah’s beginning to be a husbandman, and planting a vineyard, as the earliest thing he did after the subsidence of the flood. Throughout their sacred writings, wine is frequently mentioned, and intoxication must have been very well known among them, judging by the number of passages making mention of it. A great variety of wines is not named—nay, there are only two specifically mentioned: the wine of Helbon, which, as we have seen, was an article of merchandise at Damascus, a fat, luscious wine, as its name signifies; and the wine of Lebanon, which was celebrated for its bouquet. “The scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon” (Hos. xiv. 7). It is possible that this bouquet was natural, or it might have been artificial, for it was the custom to mix perfumes, spices, and aromatic herbs so as to enhance the flavour of the wine, as we see in Canticles viii. 2: “I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate;” by which illustration we also see that the Hebrews made wines other than those from grapes.

That it was commonly in use is proved, if it needed proof, by the miracle at the marriage at Cana, where the worldly-wise ruler of the feast says, “Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now.” That they drank water mixed with wine may be inferred by the two verses (Prov. ix. 2, 5): “She hath mingled her wine”; “Drink of the wine that I have mingled.” Their wine used to be trodden in the press, the wine being put into bottles or wine skins, specially mentioned in Joshua ix. 4, 13. In later days they had vessels of earthenware and glass, similar to those in the illustration, which were found whilst excavating in Jerusalem.

That the ancient Jews knew of other intoxicating liquors, such as palm and date wines, there can be very little doubt.

J. A.

CLASSICAL WINES.
Greek.[4]

Homer’s Wine of the Coast of Thrace—Pramnian Wine—Psithian, Capnian, Saprian, and other Wines—The Mixing of Wines—Use of Pitch and Rosin—Undiluted Wine—Wine Making—Spiced Wines—A Greek Symposium.

The only wine upon which Homer dilates, in a tone of approval approaching to hyperbole, is that produced on the coast of Thrace, the scene of several of the most remarkable exploits of Bacchus. This wine the minister of Apollo, Maron, gave to Ulysses. It was red and honey sweet, so strong that it was mingled with twenty times its bulk of water, so fragrant that it filled even when diluted the house with perfume (Od. ix. 203). Homer’s Pramnian wine is variously interpreted by various writers.

The most important wines of later times are those of the islands Chios, Thasos, Cos, and Lesbos, and a few places on the opposite coast of Asia. The Aminean wine, so called from the vine which produced it, was of great durability. The Psithian was particularly suitable for passum, and the Capnian, or smoke-wine, was so named from the colour of the grapes. The Saprian was a remarkably rich wine, “toothless,” says Athenæus, “and sere and wondrous old.”

Wine was the ordinary Greek drink. Diodorus Siculus says Dionysus invented a drink from barley, a mead-like drink called βρύτος; but there is nothing to show that this was ever introduced into Greece. The Greek wine was conducive to inebriety, and Musæus and Eumolpus (Plato, Rep. ii.) made the fairest reward of the virtuous an everlasting booze—ἡγησάμενοι κάλλιστον ἀρετῆς μισθὸν μέθην αἰώνιον. Different sorts of wine were sometimes mixed together; sea water was added to some wines. Plutarch (Quæst. Nat. 10) also relates that the casks were smeared with pitch, and that resin was mixed with their wine by the Eubœans.

Wine was mingled with hot water as well as with cold before drinking. To drink wine undiluted was looked on as a barbarism. Straining, usual among the Romans, seems to have been the reverse among the Greeks. It is seldom mentioned. The Roman wine was most likely filtered through wool. The Spartans (Herodotus, vi. 84) fancied Cleomenes had gone mad by drinking neat wine, a habit he had learned from the Scythians. The proportions of the mixture varied, but there was always more water, and half and half ἴσον ἴσῳ was repudiated as disgraceful.

The process of wine-making was essentially the same among the Greeks and the Romans. The grapes were gathered, trodden, and submitted to the press. The juice which flowed from the grapes before any force was applied was known as πρόχυμα, and was reserved for the manufacture of a particular species of rich wine described by Pliny (H. N. xiv. II), to which the inhabitants of Mitylene gave the name of πρόδρομος. The Greeks recognised three colours in wines—black or red, white or straw-colour, and tawny brown (κιῤῥός, fulvus). When wine was carried, ἀσκοί, or bags of goat-skin, were used, pitched over to make them seam-tight. The cut above, from a bronze found at Herculaneum (Mus. Borbon. iii. 28) exhibits a Silenus astride one of them.

The mode of drinking from the ἀμφορεύς, bottle or amphora, and from a wine skin, is taken from a painting on an Etruscan vase.

A spiced wine is noticed by Athenæus under the name of τρίμμα. Into the οἶνοι ὑγιεινοί, or medical wines, drugs, such as horehound, squills, wormwood, and myrtle-berries, were introduced to produce hygienic effects. Essential oils were also mixed with wines. Of these the μυῤῥινίτης[5] is mentioned by Ælian (V. H. xii. 3 I). So in the early ages when Hecamede prepares a drink for Nestor, she sprinkles her cup of Pramnian wine with grated cheese, perhaps a sort of Gruyère, and flour. The most popular of these compound beverages was the οἰνόμελι[6] (mulsum), or honey wine, said by Pliny (xiv. 4) to have been invented by Aristæus. Greek wines required no long time to ripen. The wine drank by Nestor (Odyss. iii. 391) of ten years old is an exception.

The sweet wines of the Greeks (the produce of various islands on the Ægean and Ionian Seas) were probably something like modern Cyprus and Constantia, while the dry wines, such as the Pramnian and Corinthian, were remarkable for their astringency, and were indeed only drinkable after being preserved for many years. Of the former of these Aristophanes says that it shrivelled the features and obstructed the digestion of all who drank it, while to taste the latter was mere torture.

CLASSICAL WINES.
Roman.

Falernian, Cæcuban, and other Wines—Galen’s Opinion—Columella’s Receipt—The Roman Banquet—Dessert Wines—The Supper of Nasidienus—Dedication of Cups—Wines mentioned by Pliny made of Figs, Medlars, Mulberries, and other Fruits.

Of Roman wines the Campania Felix boasted the most celebrated growths. The Falernian, Massican, Cæcuban, and Surrentine wines were all the produce of this favoured soil. The three first of these wines have been, as the schoolboy (not necessarily Macaulay’s) is only too well aware, immortalised by Horace, who doubtless had ample opportunities of forming a matured judgment about them.

The Cæcuban is described by Galen as a generous wine, ripening only after a long term of years. The Massican closely resembled the Falernian. The Setine was a light wine, and, according to Pliny, the favourite drink of Augustus, who perhaps grounded his preference on his idea that it was the least injurious to the stomach. Possibly Horace differed from his patron in taste. He never mentions this wine, which is however celebrated both by Martial and by Juvenal.

As for the Surrentine, the fiat of Tiberias has dismissed it as generous vinegar. Dr. Henderson has no hesitation in fixing upon the wines of Xeres and Madeira as those to which the celebrated Falernian bears the nearest resemblance. Both are straw-coloured, assuming a deeper tint from age. Both present the varieties of dry and sweet. Both are strong and durable. Both require keeping. The soil of Madeira is more analogous to that of the Campania Felix, whence we may conclude perhaps that the flavour and aroma of its wines are similar to those of the Campania. Finally, if Madeira or sherry were kept in earthen jars till reduced to the consistence of honey, the taste would become so bitter that, to use the expression of Cicero (Brut. 83), we should condemn it as intolerable.

The wines of antiquity present disagreeable features; sea water, for instance, and resin already mentioned. Columella advises the addition of one pint of salt water for six gallons of wine. The impregnation with resin has been still preserved, with the result of making some modern Greek wines unpalatable save to the modern Greeks themselves. Columella (De Re Rustica, xii. 19) says that four ounces of crude pitch mingled with certain aromatic herbs should be mixed with two amphoræ, or about thirteen gallons of wine.

Ancient wines were also exposed in smoky garrets until reduced to a thick syrup, when they had to be strained before they were drunk. Habit only it seems could have endeared these pickled and pitched and smoked wines to the Greek and Roman palates, as it has endeared to some of our own caviare and putrescent game.

To drink wine unmixed was, it has been said before, held by the Greeks to be disreputable. Those who did so were said to be like Scythians. The Maronean wine of Homer was mixed with twenty measures of water. The common proportion in the more polished days of Greece was three or four parts of water to one of wine. But probably Greece, like Rome, had many a Menenius who loved a cup of hot wine with not a drop of allaying Tiber in it. If the condition of Alcibiades in the Platonic symposium was the result of wine so diluted, the wine must have been strong indeed.

The Grecian and Roman banquet began with the mulsum, of mingled wine and honey. The dessert wines among the Greeks were the Thasian and Lesbian; among the Romans the Alban, Cæcuban, and Falernian, and afterwards the Chian and Lesbian.

In the triumphal supper of Cæsar in his dictatorship Pliny says Falernian flowed in hogsheads and Chian in gallons. At the well-known Horatian supper of Nasidienus, the Cæcuban and indifferent Chian were handed round before the host advised Mæcenas that Alban and Falernian were procurable if he preferred them.

Juvenal and Martial tell us of the complaint of clients, that while the master and his friends drank the best wine out of costly cups, they themselves had to put up with ropy liquors in coarse, half-broken vessels. Human nature has changed little in this respect since those satirists wrote.

The old fashion of dedicating cups to divinities led perhaps to our modern system of drinking healths. Sometimes as many cups were drunk to a person as there were letters in the name of the person so honoured.

It was better then for the bibulous to toast the ancient Sempronia or Messalina than the modern Meg or Kate.

Hydromeli, made of honey and five-year-old rain-water; oxymeli, made of honey, sea-salt, and vinegar; hydromelon, made of honey and quinces; hydrorosatum, a similar compound with the addition of roses; apomeli, water in which honeycomb had been boiled; omphacomeli, a mixture of honey and verjuice; myrtites, a compound of honey and myrtle seed; rhoites, a drink in which the pomegranate took the place of the myrtle; œnanthinum, made from the fruit of the wild vine; silatum, taken, according to Festus, in the forenoon, and made of Saxifragia major (Forcellini) or Tordylium officinale (Liddell and Scott); sycites, wine of figs; phœnicites, wine of palms; abrotonites, wine of wormwood; and adynamon, a weak wine for the sick—are most of them mentioned as drinks in Pliny.[7] This author also mentions drinks made of sorbs, medlars, mulberries, and other fruits, of asparagus, origanum, thyme, and other herbs. Hippocrates praises wine as a medical agent. In his third book the father of medicine gives a description of the general qualities and virtues of wines, and shows for what diseases they are in his opinion advantageous. For more information on wines the reader may consult Sir Edward Barry, Dr. Alexander Henderson, and Cyrus Redding. Henderson, who was, like Barry, a physician, did not always agree with him. Barry’s observations, according to Henderson, are chiefly borrowed from Bacci. Those not so borrowed are for the most part “flimsy and tedious.”

The vessels and other drinking cups were commonly ranged on an abacus of marble, something like our sideboard. It was large, if Philo Judeus is to be believed. Pliny, speaking of Pompey’s spoils in the matter of the pirates, says the number of jewel-adorned drinking cups was enough to furnish nine abaci. Cicero charges Verres with having plundered the abaci.

When Rome was in the height of her luxury, murrhine cups were introduced from the East. What this substance was, the ruins of Pompeii have never revealed; some maintain it was porcelain, others think it was a species of spar.

Dr. Henderson adopts the opinion of M. de Rozière that these cups were of fluor-spar; but this article is not found in Karamania, from which district of Parthia both Pliny and Propertius agree that they came, though they differ with respect to their nature; its geographic situation seems confined to Europe. The anecdote told by Lampridius of Heliogabalus (502) proves, not the similarity of material, but only the equal rareness and value of vessels of onyx and murrhine.

AMPHORÆ, RHYTONS, ETC. (Brit. Mus.).

A writer in the Westminster Review for July, 1825, believes them to have been porcelain cups from China; the expression of Propertius, “cocta focis,” proves that they were manufactured. In the time of Belon (1555) the Greeks called them the myrrh of Smyrna, from murex, a shell. From this it seems that their name was given to the vases from a resemblance of colours to those of the murex. Stolberg (Travels, ix. 280) says he saw in a collection at Catania a little blue vase, believed to be a vas murrhinum.

The modern jars in any of the wine districts of Italy, such as Asti Montepulciano or Montefiascone, thin earthen two-handled vessels holding some twenty quarts, are almost identical with the ancient amphoræ. Suetonius speaks of a candidate for the quæstorship who drank the contents of a whole amphora at a dinner given by Tiberius. This amphora was probably of a smaller size. Wooden vessels for wine seem to have been unfamiliar to the Greeks and Romans; they, however, occasionally employed glass. Bottles, vases, and cups of that material, which may be seen often enough now in collections of antiquities, show the great taste which in these and in other matters they possessed. A few of these are given to illustrate our text. Skins of animals, rendered impervious by oil or resinous gums, were probably the most ancient receptacles for wine after it was taken from the vat. To these there are frequent allusions in Homer and Isaiah. Vessels of clay, with a coating of pitch, were introduced subsequently.

NORTHERN DRINKING.

Beowulf—Ale—Beer—Mead—English Wine—The Mead Hall—Drinking Horns—Tosti and Harold—Pigment, etc.—The Clergy, etc., drinking—Northern Wine drinking—King Hunding—Brewing—Strange Drinking Vessels, and their Use—Punishment of Drunkards.

Sailing from the north, being lured to the south with visions of plunder and luxury, came the Danish and Norwegian Vikings, and, as England was the nearest to them, she received an early visit. With them they brought their habit of deep drinking, which was scarcely needed, as on that score the then inhabitants of England could pretty well hold their own. Their liquors seem to have been ale, ealu, beer, beor, wine, win, and mead, medo.

There was a difference between those that drank ale and those that drank beer, as we find in Beowulf[8]:—

“Full oft have promis’d,

with beer drunken,

Over the ale cup,

sons of conflict,

that they in the beer-hall

would await

Grendel’s warfare

with terrors of edges:

then was this mead-hall,

at morning tide,

this princely court, stain’d with gore;

when the day dawn’d,

all the bench-floor

with blood bestream’d,

the hall, with horrid gore;

of faithful followers I own’d the less,

of dear nobles,

who then death destroyed.

Sit now to the feast,

and unbind with mead

thy valiant breast with my warriors

as thy mind may excite.

Then was for the sons of the Goths

altogether

in the beer hall

a bench clear’d;

there the strong of soul

went to sit

tumultuously rejoicing:

the thane observ’d his duty,

who in his hand bare

the ornamented ale-cup,

he pour’d the bright, sweet liquor:

the gleeman sang at times

serene in Heorot:

there was joy of warriors,

no few nobles

of Danes and Weders.”

In Dugdale’s Monasticon (ed. 1682, p. 126), in a Charter of Offa to the Monastery of Westbury, three sorts of ale are mentioned. Two tuns full of hlutres aloth (Clear ale), a cumb full of lithes aloth (mild ale), and a cumb full of Welisces aloth (Welsh ale), which is again mentioned as cervisia Walliæ.

But though beer and ale were the drinks of the common folk, yet they were not despised by their leaders.

[9]“At times before the nobles

Hrothgar’s daughter

to the earls in order

the ale cup bore.”

We see the social difference between ale and wine drinkers in one of the Cotton MSS. (Tib. A. 3), where a lad having been asked what he drank replied: “Ale, if I have it; Water, if I have it not.” Asked why he does not drink wine, he says: “I am not so rich that I can buy me wine; and wine is not the drink of children or the weak-minded, but of the elders and the wise.”

The English at that time grew the Vine for wine-making purposes; indeed, very good wine can now be, and is, made from English grapes. Every monastery had its vineyard, and to this day London has six Vine Streets and one Vineyard Walk. The wine-hall seems to have been a different apartment to either the mead or ale-halls, and of a superior order.

[10]“The company all arose;

greeted then

one man another

Hrothgar Beowulf,

and bade him hail,

gave him command of the wine-hall.”

...[11]

“He strode under the clouds,

until he the wine-house,

the golden hall of men,

most readily perceiv’d,

richly variegated.”

The mead-hall seems to have answered the purpose of a common hall, as we see by the following. Speaking of Hrothgar, the poet says:—

[12]“It ran through his mind

that he a hall-house

would command,

a great mead-house,

men to make,

which the sons of men

should ever hear of;

and there within

all distribute

to young and old,

as to him God had given,

except the people’s share,

and the lives of men.

Then I heard that widely

the work was proclaim’d

to many a tribe

through this mid-earth

that a public place was building.”

Mead was considered a glorified liquor fit for Men and is thus sung of by the bard Taliesin:—

“That Maelgwn of Mona be inspired with mead and cheer us with it,

From the mead-horn’s foaming, pure, and shining liquor,

Which the bees provide, but do not enjoy;

Mead distilled, I praise; its eulogy is everywhere

Precious to the creature whom the earth maintains.

God made it to man for his happiness,

The fierce and the mute both enjoy it.”

Mead was made from honey and water, fermented, and in many languages its name has a striking similarity. In Greek, honey is methu, in Sanskrit, madhu, and the drink made therefrom in Danish, is miod, in Anglo-Saxon, medu, in Welsh, medd, whence metheglyn—medd, mead, and llyn, liquor. In Beowulf we frequently find mention of the mead-horns, and we see it vividly portrayed in the heading of this chapter, which is taken from the Bayeux Tapestry. These horns were generally those of oxen, although some were made of ivory, and were probably used because fictile ware was so easily broken in those drinking bouts in which they so frequently indulged. Another reason was doubtless that they promoted conviviality, for, like the classical Rhyton, they could not be set down like a bowl, but must either be nursed, or their contents quaffed.

Many examples of drinking horns remain to us, and illustrations of two are here given: one that of Ulph, belonging to, and now kept at, York Minster, and the other the Pusey horn. These are veritable drinking horns; but there are many other tenure horns in existence, which are hunting horns.

The Pusey Horn.

This horn is an old tenure horn. It was once the custom, when making a gift of land, instead of making out a deed of gift, to present some article of personal use, such as a knife, a drinking or hunting horn, and with it the manor or land, the recipient keeping the present, as a proof that the land was given him. This Pusey horn is said to have been given by King Knut to William Pewse, and on the silver-gilt band, to which are appended dog’s legs and feet, is inscribed in Gothic letters—

“Kyng Knowde geve Wyllyam Pewse

This horne to holde by thy lond.”

It is an ox horn, dark brown, and is 25½ inches long, having a silver-gilt rim, and at the small end a hound’s head, also of silver-gilt, which unscrews, thus enabling it to be used either as a drinking or hunting horn.

Ulph’s horn is considered of somewhat later date, and is of ivory.

Ulph’s Horn.

Of this horn Dugdale[13] says: “About this time also, Ulphe, the son of Thorald, who ruled in the west of Deira,[14] by reason of the difference which was like to rise between his sons, about the sharing of his lands and lordships after his death, resolved to make them all alike; and thereupon, coming to York, with that horn wherewith he was used to drink, filled it with wine, and before the altar of God, and Saint Peter, Prince of the Apostles, kneeling devoutly, drank the wine, and by that ceremony enfeoffed this church with all his lands and revenues. The figure of which horn, in memory thereof, is cut in stone upon several parts of the choir, but the horn itself, when the Reformation in King Edward the VIth’s time began, and swept away many costly ornaments belonging to this church, was sold to a goldsmith, who took away from it those tippings of gold wherewith it was adorned, and the gold chain affixed thereto; since which, the horn itself, being cut in ivory in an eight square form, came to the hands of Thomas, late Lord Fairfax.”

He, dying in 1671, it came into the possession of his next relation, Henry, Lord Fairfax, who restored its ornaments in silver-gilt, and restored it to the cathedral authorities. It bears the following inscription:—

“Cornv hoc, Vlphvs in occidentali parte
Deiræ princeps, vna cum omnibvs terris
et redditibvs suis olim donavit.
Amissvm vel abreptvm.
Henricvs dom. Fairfax demvm restitvit.
Dec. et capit. de novo ornavit.
A.D. MDC. LXXV.”

Most of us know Longfellow’s poem of King Witlaf’s drinking horn, a story which may be found in Ingulphus, who says that Witlaf, King of Mercia, who lived in the reign of Egbert, gave to the Abbey of Croyland the horn used at his own table, for the elder monks of the house to drink out of it on festivals and saints’ days, and that when they gave thanks, they might remember the soul of Witlaf the donor. That they had some horn of the kind is probable, for the same chronicler says that when the monastery was almost destroyed by fire, this horn was saved.

Besides the liquors above mentioned, the Anglo-Saxons had others, as we see in a passage of Henry of Huntingdon (lib. vi.), which is probably an invention, the same story being told by Florence of Worcester, of Caradoc, the son of Griffith, A.D. 1065. However, he says that in 1063, in the king’s palace at Winchester, Tosti seized his brother Harold by the hair, in the royal presence, and while he was serving the king with wine; for it had been a source of envy and hatred that the king showed a higher regard for Harold, though Tosti was the elder brother. Wherefore, in a sudden paroxysm of passion, he could not refrain from this attack on his brother.

Tosti departed from the king and his brother in great anger, and went to Hereford, where Harold had purveyed large supplies for the royal use. There he butchered all his brother’s servants, and inclosed a head and an arm in each of the vessels containing wine, mead, ale, pigment,[15] morat,[16] and cider, sending a message to the king that when he came to his farm he would find plenty of salt meat, and that he would bring more with him. For this horrible crime the king commanded him to be banished and outlawed.

There is no doubt but that the Anglo-Saxons drank to excess, and thought no shame of it. Many times in Beowulf are we told of their being dragged from the mead-benches by their enemies and slaughtered, and in a fragment of an Anglo-Saxon poem on Judith we read:—

“Then was Holofernes

Enchanted with the wine of men:

In the hall of the guests

He laughed and shouted,

He roared and dinn’d,

That the children of men might hear afar,

How the sturdy one

Stormed and clamoured,

Animated and elate with wine

He admonished amply

Those sitting on the bench

That they should bear it well.

So was the wicked one all day,

The lord and his men,

Drunk with wine;

The stern dispenser of wealth;

Till that they swimming lay

Over drunk.

All his nobility

As they were death slain,

Their property poured about.

So commanded the lord of men,

To fill to those sitting at the feast,

Till the dark night

Approached the children of men.”

Even the clergy and monks drank probably more than was good for them, for a priest was forbidden by law to eat or drink at places where ale was sold. But that did not prevent their drinking at home; their benefactors provided well for that, as one instance will show. Ethelwold allowed the Monastery of Abingdon a great bowl, from which the drinking vessels of the brothers were filled twice a day. At Christmas, Easter, Pentecost, the Nativity and Assumption of the Virgin, on the festivals of Saints Peter and Paul, and all the other saints, they were to have wine, as well as mead, twice a day; and taking the number of Saints in the Anglo-Saxon Calendar, it must have gone hard with them, if this was not almost an every-day occurrence.

The Northern nations did not lose their love of drink as time rolled on, as we may find in the pages of Olaus Magnus. They drank wine, but owing to the extreme cold it was not of native production, but imported. In this illustration we see the vessel that has brought it, and the bush outside, denoting that it was to be sold. They got it from Spain, Italy, France, and Germany, but he says that the wine most in repute was a Spanish wine called Bastard, which Shakspeare mentions more than once, as (1 Henry IV. act ii. sc. 4) Prince Henry relating his adventures with a drawer, says, “Anon, anon, sir! Score a pint of Bastard in the Half Moon.”

He gives receipts for making Hydromel, or Mead, which was to be made of one part honey, and four of boiling water, to be well stirred, boiled, and skimmed. Hops were then to be added, then casked, and brewers’ yeast added. Then to be strained, and it was fit for drinking in eight days. He tells a pathetic story of King Hunding, who being sorely grieved at the loss of his brother-in-law, Gutthorm, called all his nobility around him to a great feast, and had a large tun, filled with hydromel, placed in the middle of the hall. When his guests were sufficiently inebriated, he threw himself into the liquor, and died sweetly.

Beer had they, made of malt and hops, and he gives various methods of brewing, and also a list of divers beers and their medicinal qualities.

He also gives an illustration of various drinking vessels then (16th cent.) in use among the Danes and Swedes, where is here reproduced. Here we see some plain, others ornamental with runes, and some with very curious handles. He says they were mostly of brass, copper, or iron, because in that cold climate the liquor they held had to be warmed over the fire.

An old translation of a portion of his Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus gives the following account “Of the manner of drinking amongst the Northern People.”

“It will not displease curious Readers to hear how the custom is of drinking amongst the Northern People. First, they hold it Religion to drink the healths of Kings and Princes, standing, in reverence of them; and here they will, as it were, sweat in the contention, who shall at one or two, or more draughts, drink off a huge bowl. Wherefore they seem to sit at Table as if they had Crowns on their heads, and to drink in a certain kind of vessel; which, it may be, may cause men that know it not, to admire it. But that were more admirable to see the servants go in a long train, in troops, as Pastours of Harts with horns, that they may drink up those Cups full of beer to the Ghests. And, not content with these Ceremonies, they will strive to shew their Sobriety, by setting such a high Cup full of Beer upon their naked heads, and dance and turn round with it; in like manner they deliver other Cups which they bring in both hands to the Ghests to drink off, at equall draughts, which are full of Wine, Ale, Mede, Metheglin, or new Wine.”

He winds up with a moral dissertation on the punishment of drinkers, and, after detailing the various effects of alcohol on different races, as rendering the Gaul petulant, the German quarrelsome, the Goth obstreperous, and the Finn lachrymose, he suggests that drunkards should be seated on a sharp wedge, compelled to drink a mighty horn of beer, and then be hauled up and down by a rope.

J. A.

WINES.

Definition—Various Meanings of Wine—Alcohol—Varieties of Wine—Miller—Professor Mulder—Origin of Wine—Brook of Eshcol—Strabo and Reland—Francatelli’s Order of Wines—Classification of M. Batalhai Reis.

In the matter of wine, as in that of beer, it is perhaps as well to commence with a dictionary description or definition. Ogilvie declares it to be the “fermented juice of the grape, or fruit of the vine.” It is, however, also the juice of certain fruits, prepared in imitation of wine obtained from grapes, but distinguished by naming the source whence it is derived, as currant wine, gooseberry wine, etc.; and a third meaning of wine—a meaning with which we have happily little to do—is the effect of drinking wine in excess, or intoxication.[17]

Wines are practically distinguished by their colour, flavour, stillness or effervescence, and what is known as hardness or softness. The differences in quality depend on the vines, the soils, the exposure of the vineyards, the treatment of the grapes, and the mode of manufacture. The alcohol[18] contained is the leading characteristic. In strong ports and sherries this varies from about 16 to 25 per cent. It is about 7 per cent. in claret, hock, and other so-called light wines. Wine containing about 13 per cent. of alcohol may be assumed to be fortified, as it is called, with brandy or other spirit.

The varieties of wine produced are said to be “almost endless.” This great number of wines is in some measure owing to an interesting fact mentioned by Miller in his Organic Chemistry (3rd ed. p. 187), who tells us that a particular variety of grape, when grown upon the Rhine, furnishes a species of hock; the same grape, when raised in the valley of the Tagus, yields Bucellas, in which the palate of a connoisseur may possibly detect the flavour of hock; whilst in the island of Madeira the same grape produces the wine known as Sercial, which, though generally allowed to be a delicious wine, has suggested, it seems, to no skilled palate the flavour either of Bucellas or of hock.

It would therefore be more logical to commence an article on wines with an article on the grapes from which they are produced, but we fear it would be far less interesting. Of the chemical composition of wine, and of its uses in health and disease, on which so many books from the days of old have been already written, we shall, in accordance with our preface, say nothing at all, or very little. Every person who feels himself or herself interested in this latter matter may learn as much as he or she will from the pages of the Lancet, while Professor Mulder has probably written enough about the former to satisfy the most anxious student.

The origin of most things is obscure. Treatises have been composed about that of wine. We have no intention of reproducing aught of them in the present work. Let us be content to suppose that wine had its origin, again like most things, somewhere at some time in the East. The date of its introduction into Greece is no more known than that of its introduction into Italy. A traditional credit is due to Saturn, to Noah, and to Bacchus as early wine manufacturers. Certainly in Palestine they had the advantage of fine grapes. On the well-known historic occasion of Moses sending men to search the land of Canaan, in the time of the first ripe fruit, we learn that when they came unto the brook of Eshcol, they cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes and “bare it between two upon a staff.” It has been perhaps somewhat hastily assumed that the fruit was therefore necessarily of a large size. There may have been other reasons for this proceeding than an enormity of weight. But if, as is generally imagined, these grapes were unusually fine and large, wine makers would be clearly benefited thereby. In support of this interpretation of the passage in Numbers, Strabo has declared that some of the grapes in the Holy Land measured two feet in length; and Reland has not hesitated to declare, as if unwilling to be outdone by Strabo, that some bunches are of ten pounds weight.

This prefatory matter could make no pretence to completeness if it omitted an instruction for the service of wines, denoting the order in which they should be drank at the dinner table, which has already been given by an adept. Whether the matter is more admirable, or the style, it is difficult to determine.

“I would recommend,” says Francatelli, “all bon vivants desirous of testing and thoroughly enjoying a variety of delectable wines, without being incommoded by the diversity of those introduced for their learned degustation, to bear in mind that they should be drunk in the following order;” viz., “When it happens that oysters preface the dinner, a glass of Chablis or Sauterne is their most proper accompaniment.”

After soup of any kind, genuine old Madeira, East India Sherry, or Amontillado are recommended as “welcome stomachics.” But you are to avoid, as you value your health, drinking punch after Turtle soup, especially Roman punch. With fish, a large variety of wines, such as Pouilly, Meursault, Montrachet, Barsac, and generally all dry white wines, is allowed. With the entrées you are permitted to drink any variety of Bordeaux or Burgundy.

Second course and dessert wines are given at too great a length to admit of reproduction. About these a “question of the highest importance” arises as to which should be preferred. But here Francatelli remembers a fact which might have spared him his vast labour on this service of wines: that “it is difficult, not to say impossible, to lay down rules for the guidance of the palate.” The sanguine person, we are told, will prefer the genuine Champagne; the phlegmatic, Sherry or Madeira. The splenetic and melancholy man will be prone to select Roussillon and Burgundy. The bilious will imbibe Bordeaux. In few words, “Burgundy is aphrodisiac, Champagne is captious, Roussillon restorative, and Bordeaux stomachic.” By careful attention to the foregoing remarks, the reader will happily be preserved from any serious mistake in the matter of his dinner. But other meals must also be taken into consideration, about which Francatelli preserves a Sibylline and mysterious silence. For instance, luncheon. We learn, however, from another source that there are luncheon sherries and dessert sherries. With lunch the brown, rich, and full-bodied Raro may be suitably drunk; but the pale Solera and the soft yet nutty Oloroso should make their appearance at dessert alone.

M. Batalhai Reis, Consul for Portugal at Newcastle-on-Tyne, in a report on the wine trade of England, has troubled himself thus in the interests of posterity to classify the wines of the world.

Class I.—Table Wines.

Alcohol and sugar imperceptible. Taste acid and astringent.

Division A. Red.

Group 1. Acid. Examples: Inferior Bordeaux and Burgundies, Wines from North of Portugal.

Group 2. Astringent. Examples: Superior Bordeaux and Burgundies, Collares from Portugal.

Division B. White.

Group 1. Simple Flavour. Example: Rhine Wines.

Group 2. Complex Flavour. Example: Bucellas of Portugal.

Class II.—Transition Wines.

Alcohol and sugar perceptible. Taste astringent. Flavour complex.

Division A. Red. Examples: Many Spanish and Portuguese wines.

Division B. White. Examples: Many Spanish and Portuguese wines.

Class III.—Generous Wines.

1st Family. Madeira type. Wines of the Canaries, Azores, Lisbon; Carcanellas, Sherry, Marsala, and Cyprian wines.

2nd Family. Port type.

3rd Family. Tokay, Malaga.

4th Family. Château Yquem, Johannisberg, Steinberg.

Class IV.—Sparkling Wines.

Group A. Natural.

Group B. Artificial.

This division of the wines of the world is presented to the reader as a literary curiosity. It is at once simple and scientific. In a word, no book on wines can be considered complete without it. In the succeeding pages Wines as Beers are, for convenience of reference, arranged after the alphabetical order of their countries.

Africa: Constantias—Rota—Mascara. America: Catawbas—Muscatel—Chacoli—Mosto. Australia: Carbinet—Kaludah—Verdeilho—Conatto. Canaries: Vidueño—Sack. England: Home-made Wines.

Africa.

Of this country the most important wines of the present are, perhaps, Pontac, Hanepoot, Frontignac, and Drakenstein. On the wines of the Cape of Good Hope, Dr. Edward Kretschmar is a great authority. Kokwyn, made from Muscat grapes, resembles Malaga. The best dry white wines, called Cape Hocks, are produced in the village of Paarl. The Constantias, so called from the wife of the Dutch governor, Van der Stell, are of three kinds. These excellent sweet wines are too frequently falsified and adulterated before reaching the palate of the English consumer. A red wine, called Rota, is made at Stellenbosch. Cape Madeira is a boiled and mixed wine. Stein wine is excellent when old. Red Cape, when drunk in the country, is a “sound, good wine,” says Cyrus Redding.[19] The wine of Morocco is chiefly made by the Jews; it is light, acid, and will not keep. In Tetuan a wine is made nearly equal, according to Cyrus Redding, to the Spanish wine of Xeres. Palm wines are, of course, common. The people of Cacongo prepare a wine called Embeth, and those of Benin Pali and Pardon. The Caffres make a wine called Pombie, from millet or Guinea corn.[20] In Congo they drink a wine called Milaffo, which will not keep beyond three days.

Of the many wines produced at Algiers, the best is probably the white wine of Mascara, situated on a slope of the plane of Egbris, 1,800 feet above the sea level. The Arabic name of the place is a corruption of Umm-al-asakir, or the Mother of Soldiers. The wine is the principal industry of Algiers. It is eagerly bought up by agents of Bordeaux houses. Wines of inferior quality are made at Boue, Tlemcen, Medeah, and Milianah. The wines of Oran are said to resemble the small wines of Languedoc. In ancient times the valley of the Nile produced the wines of Mareotis, Mendes, Koptos, and Arsinoe, and its Delta the liqueur wine of Sebenytus.

America.

The first attempt to cultivate the vine in North America was made, we are informed by Drs. Thudichum and Dupré, in 1564. Some of its best known wines at the present time are the Catawbas[21] (still and sparkling), red Aliso and Angelico. Wine has been made from the vines on the Ohio, said to resemble Bordeaux in quality. In several parts of Mexico, as at Passo del Norte, at Zalaya, and at St. Louis de la Paz, wines are made of tolerable flavour. The red wine of California is agreeable. In Florida, according to Sir John Hawkins, wine was made from a grape like that of Orleans, as far back as 1564. The island of Cuba possesses a “light, cool, sharp wine,” according to Redding.

In South America wine was made long ago in Paraguay. A sweet wine resembling Malaga is made at Mendoza, at the foot of the Andes, and is found to improve by transportation some thousand miles across the Pampas. The wines made in Chili and Peru are white and red. The Muscatel of Chili is considered to be especially good.[22] The white wine of Nasca is inferior. The wine of Pisco is highly esteemed. Though the white is held by connoisseurs to be superior to the red wine of Chili, yet it is little drunk in the cradle of its production. Chacoli is a wine commonly patronised by labourers. The Mosto of Concepcion differs from Mosto asoleado by the grapes of the latter being sundried for some twenty days.

Australia.

Australian wines are pretty well known from our tradesmen’s circulars. For instance, there is the Gouais, the Carbinet, a soft wine like Burgundy, the Mataro, the Sauvignon. There is that “elegant dinner wine,” Kaludah, the Singleton Red or White Hermitage, “noted for its refinement”; the Tintara Ferruginous, of “immense power and generous quality”; the Tokay Imperatrice; and the Alexandrian Moscat, both poetically described as “abounding in memories of the sun which begot them,” and possessing the “most beautiful bouquet that can be imagined,” with a flavour “resembling the first crush in the mouth of three or four fine ripe Muscatel grapes—the large white oval ones—covered with a light bloom, and attached to a clean, thin stalk.”

Drs. Thudichum and Dupré, who are themselves indebted to a publication by Toovey, have given an excellent description of these wines. Verdeilho is a wine, like Madeira, of delicate aroma and a full body; Frontignac is described as a thin white wine with a slight taste of the Muscat grape, being a fictitious elderflower flavour; Malbee is described as made from “claret” grape; Tavoora is described as a pure “port” of 1859; Tintara, a red, clear wine; Adelaide, a pure white wine, mainly from Riessling grapes with a soupçon of Muscatel, “a little too fiery for greatness.” Wattlesville is an acidulous white wine. The poor and acid Chasselas, the strong-scented Highercombe, said to resemble good Sauterne, with many varieties of so-called claret, as Emu, St. Hubert, and so-called Hock, as Heron and Royal Reserve, are also imported from Australia. The Conatto is a rich liqueur with a flavour of Curaçoa and Rum Shrub combined.

Canaries.

The Canary Islands have long been celebrated for their wines. The favourite Teneriffe wine is Vidueño or Vidonia. Canary sack is supposed to have been made from the Malvasia sweet grape, whereas the modern sack is dry (sec). The best vineyards are at Orotava, S. Ursula, Ycod de los Vinos, Buenavista, and Valle de Guerra.

England.

British made wines hold no very high rank. A cheap foreign manufacture is, according to some of their vendors, gradually ousting them from the market. But at one time they formed a part of the education of the good housewives of Great Britain. Home wines were chiefly made from plums, apples, gooseberries, bilberries, elderberries, blackberries, currants (red and black), raspberries, cherries, cowslips, parsnips, raisins, greengages, damsons, ginger, oranges, and lemons. Less commonly and in former times we had wines from mulberries, quinces, peaches, apricots, and from the sap of the birch, beech, sycamore, and other trees. Years ago “sweets” or home-made wines were sent from Scotland and Ireland, such as ginger wine and so-called cherry and raspberry whiskies. The flowers of meadow-sweet (Spiræa ulmaria) yield a fragrant distilled water, which is said to be used by wine merchants to improve the flavour of their wines. In a little work by Mr. G. Vine on Home-made Wines, the reader will find numerous receipts how to make and keep these wines, with observations on gathering and preparing the fruit, fining, bottling, and storing. A correspondent of the Gardeners’ Chronicle gives a receipt for beer wine, a beverage which has puzzled many connoisseurs. The curious may find it also quoted in Vine’s brochure.

The manufacture of home-made wines is familiar. An excellent wine is sometimes made from a mixture of the fruits above mentioned, as, for instance, that from gooseberries and currants. All home-made wines are prone to run into acetous fermentation without the addition of a due proportion of pure spirits. Plums or sloes, with other ingredients, can, it is said, be turned into excellent fruity port, the “very choice” kind, silky, soft, and full bodied. A wine said to be agreeable is also made from the red berries of the mountain ash or service-tree (pyrus aucuparia). Birch wine is still made in some parts of England. Morewood gives a long receipt for its manufacture. Like most other wines, it improves greatly with age. This is especially true of parsnip wine. From potatoes which have suffered a sort of malting from frost, a tolerable wine has been obtained. It is said—but there are people who will say anything—that a great portion of the champagne drunk in this country is made from sugar and green gooseberries. Rhubarb wine has been affirmed to be synonymous with British champagne. The reader anxious on this subject may consult Dr. Shannon’s elaborate Treatise on Brewing. Cowslip wine is all too like some of the Muscatel wines of Southern France, and the wine of the Sambucus nigra has been more than once, through some unlucky accident, confused with Frontignac.

FRENCH WINES.

The Great Makers of Champagne—Its Manufacture—Bottling—Treatment—Bordeaux or Claret—Its early Use and Name—Whence it comes—The different Growths—White Wines of the District—Burgundy—Different Growths and Qualities—Other Wines.

Champagne.

Reims and Epernay are the two great centres of the Champagne district; but Reims, from its size and antiquity, must be considered its capital. Here are the establishments of Pommery & Greno, Ernest Moy, Théophile Roederer & Co., Louis Roederer & Co., Henriot & Co., Permet & Fils, De St. Marceaux & Co., Werlé & Co. (successors to the renowned Veuve Cliquot), Heidsieck & Co., De Lossy & Co., G. H. Mumm & Co., Jules Mumm & Co., Piper & Co., and many others of lesser note.

The wines of this district have, for centuries, been famous, and especially beloved of kings and potentates. Our Henry VIII. had a vineyard at Ay, and, in order to know that he got the genuine article, he had a superintendent of his own on the spot. Francis I., Leo X., and Charles V. of Spain, all had vineyards in the Champagne district. But the wine they obtained thence was not sparkling: that was to come later, and is said to have been the invention of Dom Petrus Perignon, who died in 1715, monk of, and cellarer to, the Royal Monastery of St. Peter’s at Hautvilliers. He was especially happy in his blends of wine, and having found out the secret of highly charging the wine, naturally, with carbonic acid, is said to have introduced the cork and string necessary to confine it in its bottles.

Champagne Wine owes its goodness, in the first place, to the soil on which it is grown, which is unique in its mixture of chalk, silica, light clay, and oxide of iron; in the second, to the very great care and delicate manipulation which the wine receives. Every doubtful grape is discarded, and the carts conveying the grapes from the vineyard go at a most funereal pace, so that none of their precious contents should get bruised; for if these little grapes (for they are little larger than currants) get at all crushed, or partly fermented, in carriage, the fruit is rendered absolutely worthless for Champagne purposes.

Very great care, too, is exercised in the pressing. The grapes are laid in carefully stacked heaps upon the floor of the press, where they are left for a time, and then the first gentle, but firm, sustained squeeze is applied. The juice thus extracted is the cream of the grape, and is used only for the finest brands. There are six of these squeezes made, each more powerful than the last; and the result of each is, of course, inferior in quality to its predecessor, till the sixth, called the rébêche,[23] is reached, which produces a coarse wine, reckoned only fit to be given to the workmen.

The must begins to ferment more or less quickly, according to the temperature, in the casks, at the end of ten or twelve hours, and the process continues for a considerable time, during which the colour changes from pale pink to a light straw tint. About three months are allowed to elapse, when the fermentation stops through repeated rackings and the cold of the season.

And now the real trouble of the Champagne manufacturer begins. First, there is the blend, which varies in the case of each manufacturer. The produce of the different vineyards is mixed in enormous vats, according to the recipe in vogue in the particular establishment, and to this mixture is added, if necessary, a proportion of some old wine of a superior vintage. A most subtle, carefully educated, and exquisite taste is required to discern when the wine, in this crude state, has acquired the proper flavour and bouquet. Then comes the important point of effervescence—a source of much anxiety to the manufacturer, for the extremest care is required to regulate the quantity of carbonic acid gas, so that there shall be neither too little nor too much. For if there be too little, the wine will be flat; and if there be too much, the bottles will burst by thousands. An instrument, called a glucometer, or saccharometer, is used to measure the amount of saccharine matter in the wine at this point; and if the necessary standard be not reached, the deficiency is supplied by the purest sugar candy. To the ordinary palate, at this stage it differs in no respect from still white wine, of somewhat tart flavour, and is now drawn off into other casks to undergo the next treatment in the process; viz., the fining, to make it bright, and remove what is known to connoisseurs of wine as “ropiness.”

The wine is now ready for bottling, and the danger to be avoided is the bursting of the bottles, for the pressure of the gas is tremendous; hence it is that the champagne bottle is the most solid and massive in use. The bottling takes place, as a rule, about eight months after the grapes have been first pressed, and the precautions against breakage are of the most minute description. The instant any symptoms of bursting display themselves, the wine has to be removed to a cooler temperature; but even with every precaution, the loss sustained by the bursting of bottles is often very serious indeed, sometimes to an almost ruinous extent. The risk of breakage is generally almost past by the end of October, and the bottles are then kept in the cellars for a period ranging from eighteen months to three years, according to the custom of the establishment.

But even now all is not over, for, during this period, a sediment, resulting from the fermentation of the wine, has been deposited, which must be removed before the wine is ready for consumption; and very troublesome work it is to get rid of this sediment. The bottles are placed in a slanting direction with the necks downward, and the angle of inclination is altered from time to time till they stand almost perpendicular, whilst every time the position is changed, the bottle is sharply twisted round, so that the sediment may not cling to the sides. Finally, the deposit collects in a ball in the neck of the bottle, from whence it is “disgorged”—literally blown out—when the original cork is removed. A temporary stopper is then inserted until the liqueur, which is to give the wine its distinctive character, dry or sweet, is introduced. This liquor consists of a preparation of the very finest sugar candy, the best Champagne, and the oldest and purest Cognac.

The next process is corking, and, as we all know, champagne corks are not as other corks. They are made larger than the vent of the bottle, and are soaked in water, and very often steamed. They are somewhat expensive, the best corks used costing about threepence each; but it is a very false economy to use common corks, for the gas would escape. The pliant cork is placed in a machine which pinches it and compresses it to the size of the aperture of the bottle, and holds it there till a twenty-pound weight is let drop, on the principle of a pile-driving hammer, and drives the cork in firmly. The powerful leverage used to bring down the edge of the cork for wiring and stringing, imparts the round-shaped top peculiar to champagne corks. The bottles, after being corked and wired, are allowed to rest for two or three months, in order that the wine and the liqueur may properly amalgamate, and are then tinselled and labelled, ready for the consumer; but some of the best wines are kept for years to mature, and are, of course, of far higher value.

A sweet Champagne may be made of any wine, but a dry Champagne must be a good wine, as, if it is not sound, its acidity is detected at once; but this defect would be hidden by the liqueur necessary to make it sweet.

At Epernay, the bulk of the wine is not so good as that coming from Reims, and sells at a lower price; but there are firms there of world-wide note, such as Moet & Chandon, Perrier, Joüet & Co., Meunier Frères, Wachter & Co., etc.

Bordeaux or Claret.

In England we generally call the wines coming from Bordeaux, Clarets, the derivation of which cognomen is somewhat obscure; but it seems almost universally accepted that it comes from the French word Clairet, which is used even at the present time as a generic term for the vins ordinaires of a light and thin quality, grown in the south of France, and was in use from a very early date. The old French poet, Olivier Basselin (who died 1418 or 1419), sings:—

“Beau nez, dont les rubis ont coûté mainte pipe

De vin blanc et clairet ...”

There was, however, another Claret, a compounded wine, resembling hypocras, which Giraldus Cambrensis, who lived in the twelfth century, classes thus: “Claretum, mustum, et medonem” (Claret, must, and mead). And the venerable Franciscan, Bartholomew Glanville,[24] says: “Claretum, ex vino et melle et speciebus aromaticis est confectum” (Claret is made from wine, honey, and aromatic spices). It makes a marked feature in a curious tenure.[25] “John de Roches holds the Manor of Winterslew, in the county of Wilts, by the Service, that when our Lord the King should abide at Clarendon, he should come to the Palace of the King there, and go into the Butlery, and draw out of any vessel he should find in the said Butlery at his choice, as much Wine as should be needful for making (pro factura) a Pitcher of Claret (unius Picheri Claretti), which he should make at the King’s charge, and that he should serve the King with a Cup, and should have the vessel from whence he took the Wine, with all the Remainder of the Wine left in the Vessel, together with the Cup from whence the King should drink that Claret.” This refers to a roll of 50 Ed. III., or 1376.

FROM THE “COMPOST ET KALENDRIER DES BERGERES,” 1499.

But this is not the Claret of our days, which is the wine produced in the countries watered by the rivers Dordogne and Garonne and the Gironde, at least it should be so; but, in truth, owing to the good railway communication, wine comes to Bordeaux from every part of France, large quantities owing their birth to the banks of the Rhone, from the Hérault, Roussillon, etc.; and a judicious blending at Bordeaux, and its being shipped thence, is a very good title to its being grown in the Médoc; but the quantity shipped to all parts of the world, compared with the acreage of growth, entirely precludes the supposition that it possibly could have been the production of that district.

The nobility of the Médoc wines is small. There are only four premiers crûs, but they are magnificent. They are Château Lafitte, Château Latour, Château Margaux, and Château Haut-Brion; and all these, especially the Latour, have a flavour and seductive bouquet all their own, which is believed to arise from an extremely volatile oil contained in the grape skins, which, like all ethers, requires time to evolve and mature. But the soil, undoubtedly, has most to do with it, and this must be in a very large degree composed of fragments of rock, small and large, while the smooth round pebbles reflect the rays of the sun and throw them upwards, so as almost to surround the grapes with light and heat. Again, these stones absorbing the sun’s rays during the day, give out warmth after sunset, whilst they keep the roots of the vines cool, and prevent to a great degree the evaporation of the natural and necessary moisture of the earth.

But these premiers crûs are not always good; for instance, in 1869, Messrs. Fulcher & Baines, wine brokers, sold by auction a very large parcel of Château Margaux for about 30s. per dozen. There was no doubt but that it was genuine wine, bottled at the Château, for the cases and corks were all properly branded; but of such low quality was it, or it deteriorated so rapidly, that when sold again in 1871 the same wine only averaged 18s. per dozen.

The 2nd Growths are:—
Mouton,coming fromPauillac.
Rauzan-Segla,”Margaux.
Rauzan-Gassies,””
Léoville-Las Cases,”St. Julien.
Léoville-Poyféré,””
Léoville-Barton,””
Durfort-Vivens,”Margaux.
Lascombes,””
Gruard-La rose-Sarg,”St. Julien.
Gruard-La rose,””
Braune-Cantenac,”Cantenac.
Pichon-Longueville,”Pauillac.
Pichon-Longueville-Lalande,””
Ducru-Beaucaillou,”St. Julien.
Cos-Destournel,”St. Estèphe.
Montrose,””
3rd Growths.
Kirwan,coming fromCantenac.
Château-d’Issau,””
Lagrange,”St. Julien.
Langoa,””
Château-Giscours,”Labarde.
Malescot-St. Exupéry,”Margaux.
Cantenac-Brown,”Cantenac.
Palmer,””
La Lagune,”Ludon.
Desmirail,”Margaux.
Calon-Ségur,”St. Estèphe.
Ferrière,”Margaux.
M. d’Alesmeis Becker,””
4th Growths.
St. Pierre,coming fromSt. Julien.
Branair-Duluc,””
Talbot,””
Duhart-Milon,”Pauillac.
Poujet,”Cantenac.
La Tour-Carnet,”St. Laurent.
Rochet,”St. Estèphe.
Château-Beychevelle,”St. Julien.
La Prieuré,”Cantenac.
Marquis de Therme,”Margaux.
5th Growths.
Pontet-Canet,coming fromPauillac.
Batailley,””
Grand-Puy-Lacoste,””
Ducasse-Grand-Puy,”Pauillac.
Lynch-Bages,””
Lynch-Moussas,””
Dauzac,”Labarde.
Moulton d’Armailhacq,”Pauillac.
Le Tertre,”Arsac.
Haut-Bages,”Pauillac.
Pédesclaux,””
Belgrave,”St. Laurent.
Camensac,””
Cos-Labory,”St. Estèphe.
Clerc-Milon,”Pauillac.
Croizet-Bages,””
Cantemerle,”Macau.

These are only some of the wines of the Médoc, so that I may be excused from recapitulating the names of the different growths of the Graves, the Pays de Sauternes, the Côtes, the Palus, and those of Entredeux Mers—their name is legion, and it would answer no good purpose. Cocks, in his Bordeaux and its Wines, gives a list of 1,900 of the principal growths, so that we can have a good choice of names from which to christen our “Shilling Gladstone.”

The wines of Bordeaux used to be greatly drank in England until the great wars with France—in the last century, when, of course, their importation was prohibited—but, even then, large quantities were smuggled. They must, however, have been of better quality than the cheap stuff now imported. In Scotland, where an affinity with France always existed, it was a common drink, and very cheap; for in Campbell’s Life of Lord Loughborough (vi. 29), we find that excellent claret was drawn from the cask at eighteenpence a quart: and its downfall as a beverage in Scotland is thus sung by John Home, probably in allusion to the Methuen Treaty of 1703.

“Firm and erect the Caledonian stood,

Prime was his mutton, and his claret good:

Let him drink port, an English Statesman cried;

He drank the poison, and his spirit died.”

The white wines of these districts are delicious, and are not sufficiently appreciated in England, where we know very little of the Sauternes, Bommes, Barsac, Fargues, St. Pierre de Mons, Preignac, and those of Petits Graves and the Côtes. Chief of all is the wine of Château d’Yquem, of which Vizitelly[26] thus writes:—

“Among the white wines of the Gironde which obtained the higher class reward, two require to be especially mentioned. One, the renowned Château d’Yquem of the Marquis de Lur Saluces, the most luscious and delicately aromatic of wines, which, for its resplendent colour, resembling liquid gold, its exquisite bouquet, and rich, delicious flavour, due, according to the chemists, to the presence of Mannite, is regarded in France as unique, and which, at Vienna, naturally met with the recognition of a medal for progress.

“Mannite, the distinguished French chemist Berthelot informs us, has the peculiar quality of not becoming transformed into alcohol and carbonic acid during the process of fermentation. For a tonneau of this splendid wine twelve years old, bought direct from the Château, the Grand Duke Constantine paid, some few years since, 20,000 francs, or £800. The other wine calling for notice was La Tour Blance, one of those magnificent, liqueur-like Sauternes, ranking immediately after Château d’Yquem, and to some fine samples of which, of the vintages of 1864 and 1865, a medal for merit was awarded.

THE DILETTANTE SOCIETY.

In this illustration of “the Dilettante Society” we find that Noblemen and Gentlemen such as Lord Mulgrave, Lord Seaforth, Hon. Chas. Greville, Charles Crowle, and the Duke of Leeds, drank their claret out of the black bottle—dispensing with the decanter altogether.

“The characteristic qualities of Château d’Yquem, which certain soi-disant connoisseurs pretend to pooh-pooh, as a mere ordinary vin de liqueur, are due, in no degree, to simple accident. On the contrary, the vintaging of this wine is an extremely complicated and delicate affair. In order to insure the excessive softness and rich liqueur character which are its distinguishing qualities, the grapes, naturally excessively sweet and juicy, are allowed to dry on their stalks, preserved, as it were, by the rays of the sun, until they become covered with a kind of down, which gives to them an almost mouldy appearance. During this period, the fruit, under the influence of the sun, ferments within its skin, thereby attaining the requisite degree of ripeness, akin to rottenness.

“On the occasion of the vintage, as it is absolutely essential that the grapes should be gathered, not only when perfectly dry, but also warm, the cutters never commence work until the sun has attained a certain height, and invariably suspend their labours when rain threatens, or mists begin to rise. At the first gathering they detach simply the graines rôties, or such grapes as have dried after arriving at proper maturity, rejecting those which have shrivelled without thoroughly ripening, and, from the former, a wine of extreme softness and density, termed crème de tête, is produced.

“By the time the first gathering has terminated, other grapes will have sufficiently ripened and rotted, or dried, and both sorts are now detached, yielding the wine called vin de tête, distinguished by equal softness with the crème de tête, but combined with a larger amount of alcohol, and greater delicacy of flavour. At this point, a delay generally ensues, according to the state of the weather, it being requisite, towards the end of October, to wait while the rays of the sun, combined with the night dews, bring the remainder of the grapes to maturity, when the third gathering takes place, from which the wine, termed centre, frequently very fine and spirituous, is produced. Another delay now ensues, and then commences the final gathering, when all the grapes remaining on the stalks are picked, which, when the vintage has been properly conducted, is usually only a very small quantity, yielding what is termed the vin de queue.”

However, although it is not given to all of us to be able to afford Château d’Yquem, yet there are many of the other white wines of France, which are within ordinary limits, and which compare more than favourably with the red wines.

Burgundy and other Wines.

Verily there cannot be much amiss with wine that causes a holy man (by profession) to break forth into song as follows:—

“Nous les boirons lentement,

Nous les boirons tendrement,

Ton Clos Vougeot, ton Romanée:

Par nous la sainte liqueur,

Qui nous rechauffe le cœur,

Ne sera jamais profanée.”

More generous than the wines of Bordeaux, it has been the drink of Kings and Popes, and perhaps no vineyard has a similar honour done it as that of Clos-Vougeot (Napoleon’s favourite wine); for when a French regiment marches past that celebrated vineyard, it halts, and presents arms. On the golden slope—the Côte d’Or—is grown this wine of Burgundy, and the vignerons divide the district into two parts, the Côte de Nuits and the Côte de Beaune, the first of which produces the finest wines, from Vosne especially, whence come Romanée-Conti, La Tâche, Richebourg, Romanée-St. Vivant, La Grande Rue, Gaudichat, Malconsort, and others; but of all these Romanée Conti is king. Unfortunately the yield of this vineyard is very small, and genuine Romanée is seldom to be met with. But there are plenty of good wines to be bought at moderate prices, those of Chambertin, Volnay, Beaune, Mâcon, and Beaujolais. Chief among the white Burgundies is Chablis; but there are other sorts, not half enough drank in England—Mâcon, Pouilly, Meursault, Chevalier-Montrachet, Montrachet-Ainé, and many other fine white wines. Sparkling Burgundy is not to be despised.

The Côtes du Rhone produce fine wines, too, such as Hermitage, Côte Rôtie, Condrieu, and St. Peray; but of these, perhaps, Hermitage red and white are best known to us.

Much wine is made in the South of France, in the departments of the Hérault, the Gard, the Aude, and the Pyrenées-Orientales, whilst Languedoc has always been famous for its wines, which are very similar to some Spanish varieties. Roussillon is nearly as good as Burgundy, and, after being manipulated at Cette, is often palmed off as “Vintage Port,” and the Muscat wines of the Hérault and the Pyrenées-Orientales are particularly luscious, especially those from Lunel.

Some wines come from Corsica, but they do not find their way, as such, into the English market; no doubt, though, but we have them in some shape, for the mystifications of the wine trade are stupendous, and, to an outsider, unfathomable.

J. A.

Germany: Rhine Wines—Heidelberg Tun—Hock—Stein-wein—Asmannhäuser—Straw Wines—Goethe’s Opinion of Wine Greece: Verdea—Vino Santo—The Wine of Night. Hungary: Maszlacz—Tokay—Carlowitz—Erlauer. Italy: Monte Pulciano—Chianti—Barolo—Barbera—Montefiascone—Lacryma Christi, etc. Madeira: Malvasia—Tinta—Bual, etc. Persia: Shiraz.

Germany.

The Germans, says Cyrus Redding, like vain men of other nations, have wasted a good deal of idle conjecture on the antiquity of the culture of the vine in their country; and then, as though to show by example that this waste of idle conjecture is not confined to the Germans, Mr. Redding continues the investigation of this important matter himself. In the opinion of an experienced merchant these wines have a “distinct character and classification of their own.” Their alcoholic strength is low, averaging about 18 per cent.

This illustration dates 1608 as “A Sciographie or Modell of that stupendous vessel which is at this day shewed in the Pallace of the Count Palatine of Rhene in the citie of Heidelberg.” A model of this Tun was shown at the German Exhibition held in London, 1891. Its capacity was eclipsed by a famous tonneau, elaborately ornamented with allegorical figures, etc., which was shown in the French Exhibition of 1889. It would hold 200,000 bottles of Champagne, and came from Epernay. It had to be drawn by a large team, by road, and the French press was full of its imaginary adventures on its journey to Paris.

To the north of Coblentz the wines are of little comparative value, though a Rhenish wine has been produced at Bodendorf, near Bonn. On the Rhine or its tributary rivers between Coblentz and Mayence, all the most celebrated wines of Germany are grown. The grapes preferred for general cultivation are the Riessling, a small, white, harsh species. The true Hochheimer, daily consumed in Germany, is grown to the eastward of Mentz, between there and Frankfort. The wines mellow best in large vessels, an experience which has produced the celebrated Heidelberg Tun, holding some six hundred hogsheads. The distinguishing characteristics of German wine have been said to be generosity, dryness, fine flavour, and endurance of age. The dyspeptic will learn with delight that the strong wines of the Rhine are extremely salutary, and contain less acid than any other. It is also averred that they are never saturated with brandy. Liebfrauenmilch[27] is grown at Worms. It is full bodied, as is that of Scharlachberg. Wines of Nierstein,[28] Laubenheim, and Oppenheim are good, but Deidesheimer is considered superior to them. Hock[29] is derived from Hochheim; but nearly every town on the banks of the Rhine gives its name to some lauded vintage. The flavour of Hock is supposed to be improved by thin green glasses. Perhaps, says the judicious Redding, this is mere fancy. The Palatinate wines are cheaper Hocks. Moselles have a more delicate perfume. The whole eastern bank of the Rhine to Lorich, called the Rheingau, about fourteen miles in extent, has been famous for its wines for ages. Naturally, therefore, it was once the property of the Church. Here is Schloss-Johannisberger, once nearly destroyed by General Hoche, where a leading Rhine wine is made. Steinberger takes the next rank to Johannisberger. Gräfenberg, also once ecclesiastical property, produces wine equal to Rüdesheimer, which is a wine of the first Rhine growths. Marcobrunner, Roth, Königsbach are excellent drinks. Bacharach has lost its former celebrity. The conclusion to which a celebrated connoisseur has arrived after an exhaustive examination of German wines is this: “On the whole, the wines of Bischeim, Asmannshäuser, and Laubenheim are very pleasant wines; those of rather more strength are Marcobrunner, Rüdesheimer and Niersteiner, while those of Johannisberg, Geissenheim, and Hochheim give the most perfect delicacy and aroma.” The Germans themselves say Rhein-wein, fein-wein; Necker-wein, lecker-wein; Franken-wein, tranken-wein; Mosel-wein, unnosel-wein.[30]

The red wines of the Rhine are considered inferior to the white. Red Asmannshäuser is perhaps the best. Near Lintz Blischert is made. Königsbach and Altenahr yield ordinary wines. The most celebrated of Moselle wines is the Brauneberger, of which the varieties are numerous. A variety called Gruenhäuser was formerly styled the Nectar of the Moselle. The wines of Ahr, of which some are red, resemble Moselles, but will keep longer. Of the wines of the Neckar the most celebrated is Besigheimer. Baden, Wiesbaden, Wangen, and Würtzberg, all grow good wines. Of the last is Stein-wein, produced on a mountain so called, and named by the Hospital to which it belongs, Wine of the Holy Ghost. Leisten wines are grown on Mt. Saint Nicolas. Straw wines are made in Franconia. Calmus, a liqueur wine, like the sweet wines of Hungary, is made in the territory of Frankfurt. The best vineyards are those of Bischofsheim. Wines of Saxony are of little worth. Meissen and Guben produce the best. Naumburg makes some small wines, like inferior Burgundy. The excellence of the Rhine wines has seldom perhaps been proved more clearly than by one who loved them well. Goethe, in his Aus einer Reise am Rhein, Main und Neckar, says: “Niemand schämt sich der Weinlust, sie rühmen sich einigermaassen des Trinkens. Hübsche Frauen gestehen dass ihre Kinder mit der Mutterbrust zugleich Wein geniessen. Wir fragten ob denn wahr sey, dass es geistlichen Herren, ja Kurfürsten geglückt, acht Rheinische Maass, das heisst sechzehn unserer Bouteillen, in vierundzwanzig Stunden zu sich zunehmen? Ein scheinbar ernsthafter Gast bemerkte, man dürfe sich zu Beantwortung dieser Frage nur der Fastenpredigt ihres Weihbischofs erinnern, welcher, nachdem er das schreckliche Laster der Trunkenheit seiner Gemeinde mit den stärksten Farben dargestellt, also geschlossen habe—” But for those who understand not the German tongue we will give some of the sermon of this Church dignitary on the Rochusberg in English. “Those, my pious brethren, commit the greatest sin who misuse God’s glorious gifts. But the misuse excludes not the use. Wine, it is written, rejoices man’s heart. Therefore we are clearly intended to enjoy it. Now perhaps, beloved brethren, there is not one of you who cannot drink two measures of wine without feeling any ill effects therefrom; he, however, who with his third or fourth measure has so far forgotten himself as to abuse, beat and kick his wife and children, and to treat his dearest friend as his worst enemy, let such a one discontinue to drink three or four measures, which thus render him unpleasing to God and despicable to man. But he who with the fourth measure, nay, with his fifth or his sixth, still maintains his sense in such a manner that he can behave properly to his fellow-Christian, attend to his domestic duties, and obey his spiritual superiors as he ought, let him be thankful in modesty for the gift accorded to him. But let him not advance beyond the sixth measure, for here commonly is the term set to human power and endurance. Rare indeed is the occasion in which the benevolent God has lent a man such especial grace that he may drink eight measures—a grace which He has, however, accorded to me His servant. Let, therefore, every one take only his allotted measure und auf dass ein solches geschehe, alles Ubermaass dagegen verbannt sey, handelt sämmtlich nach der Vorschrift des heiligen Apostels welcher spricht; Prüfet alles und das Beste behaltet!”

“TASTING THE VINTAGE.”—After Hasenclever.

Greece.

The vinification of Greece is commonly imperfect. Most of its wines become vinegar in summer. Avoid, says a well-known guide-book, the wine of this country, which is generally acid and always impure.[31] The best Greek wines are those of the islands Ithaca, Zante, Tenos, Samos, Thera (Santorin),[32] and Cyprus. The white wine of Zante, called Verdea, resembles Madeira in flavour. The wine of Naxos is of considerable strength, and is greatly improved by age. A quantity of it, known as Vino Santo, is exported. Andros was sacred to Dionysus, and a tradition (Plin. ii. 103; xxxi. 13; Paus. vi. 26) says that for seven days during a festival of this god the waters of a certain fountain were changed to wine. The wine did no credit to the god, if it resembled that which this island at present produces. The “Nectar” of Morta is bitter and astringent. Dr. Charnock has recommended the Monthymet as a good mild wine, and the œconomos. A white wine, called “the wine of night,” is supplied under the distinctive names of St. Elie and Calliste; the latter is the better.

Hungary.

The wines of Hungary, we are told, “possess considerable body with a moderate astringency.” The varieties of wine known as Ausbruch and Maszlacs, including the Tokays, Rust, Menes, and many more, are of the most important character. Without the addition of dry berries the so-called natural wine or Szamorodni is obtained. The Tokay essence, a very sweet wine, should be also very old. When fifty years in bottle it costs some £3[33] for a small flask. Ausbruch, also sweet, should be also old. Maszlacz is of four different kinds. The Mezes, Male or Imperial, does not get into trade. Meograd, Krasso, and Villany from the West of Hungary are good strong wines of the second class. Wines of the third class are very numerous. There is no space to mention more than the red wines: Baranya, Presburger, Somogy, Vagh-Ujhelyer, Paulitsch, and Erdöd, and the white Miszla, Balaton, Füred, Hont, Pesth, and Weissenburger. Samlauer is one of the best white wines made at a place called Samlau, as Erlauer another good wine at Erlau. The most commonly known Hungarian wines of the present are Oedenburger, Samlauer, Neszmely, and Carlowitz.

Italy.

That Italy produces good wines is, says Cyrus Redding, undeniable. She also produces wines that are very bad. The best Italian wines are believed to be of Tuscany. As Hafiz is the authority for Shiraz, so Redi’s Bacco in Toscana should be consulted for the wines of Italy. Monte Pulciano is of a purple hue, sweet and slightly astringent. It is to this wine that Redi gives the palm, calling it la manna di Monte Pulciano. The wine of Chianti, near Sienna, is well known. Artiminio, Poncino, Antella, and Carmignano, though of less reputation, are not greatly inferior. The best Verdea[34] comes from Arcetri near Florence. Trebbiano, a gold-coloured syrup, is produced, according to Drs. Thudichum and Dupré, from grapes, “passulated on the vine by torsion of the stalk.” Montelcino, Rimaneze, and Santo Stefano are Siennese wines. Of Sardinia the chief wines are the so-called Malvasias, Giro, Aleatico, like the Tinto of Alicante, and Bosa, Ogliastra, and Sassari. Of Piedmont the principal wines are Barolo, Barbera, Nebbiolo, Braccheto. Asti, Chaumont, Alba, and Montferrat have had reputation thrust upon them. Grignolinos are made from a vine closely related to the Kadarka of Hungary, and the Carmenet of the Gironde. The wines of Genoa are of small repute. Central Italy furnishes Montefiascone,[35] with a delicious aroma, Albano, resembling Lacryma Christi, and Orvieto. The principal wine of Naples, from the base of Vesuvius, is Lacryma Christi, a rich, red, exquisite drink, affirmed by some adventurous fancies to be the Falernian of Horace. “O Christ!” said a Dutchman who drank, “why didst Thou not weep in my country?” Gallipoli, Tarento, Baia, Pausilippo, yield good wines. The islands in the Bay of Naples all produce wine; that of Caprea is of good ordinary quality, both white and red. Calabria furnishes many good wines. Muscadenes and dry wines are made at Reggio. Asprino, a white foamy wine, with a pleasant sharpness, is a favourite of the Campagna. Carigliano is a Muscadine, with a flavour of fennel. Dr. Charnock speaks highly of the wine of Capri, and of Orvieto, a delicate white wine of Rome. The disagreement of travellers about the merits of wines arises principally, of course, from a diversity of tastes, but also in the matter of Italian wines, from the fact that different wines bear the same names in different countries. There is, for instance, a vino santo and a vino greco in Naples. A Veronese wine, vino debolissimo e di niuna stima, is also called vino santo, and an excellently good wine at Brescia. It is the same with half a dozen of the most noted wines of Italy. Modico, a fine white wine from the place of that name near Salerno, was apparently a favourite of the noted School of Salernum. The best known wines out of Italy are the Barola, Barbera, and the rest which may be found on the wine-list of every padrone of an Italian restaurant; the Inferno of the Valtellina; the Lambrusco of Modena; the Chianti of Tuscan—a wine grown on the estate of Baron Ricasoli, not thought so much of in Italy as in England; and the Lacryma Christi of Naples. Most Italian wines are bottled in flasks, in the old Roman style, with oil[36] on the top, and wool over the oil.

Madeira.

Wine is first mentioned as a product of Funchal, the capital of Madeira, in the fifteenth century. In 1662, when Charles II. married the Infanta Catherine of Bragança, English merchants began to settle in Madeira. The principal varieties of Madeira are Malvasia, Bual, Sercial, Tinta, and Verdelho (the Verdea of Tuscany). In England, Madeira is now within the reach of all. At the beginning of this century, it was known only to connoisseurs. The “fine rich old Boal” is fairly familiar, and if we may trust the wine merchants, the “Very Superior Old,” variously described as full, soft, golden, delicate, and mellow, is gradually winning its way into public favour, since that same “soft fulness,” added to a delicious and yet pungent flavour, produces a drink “altogether superior” to the best Sherry.

Persia.

The ancient, most famous wines of this country were those of Chorassan, Turan, and Mazanderan. These places still produce wines; but their characteristics and reputation have, it is affirmed, become blended in the wine of Shiraz, in the province of Ferdistan, on the Persian Gulf. Chardin, the Frenchman, describes this wine as of excellent quality, but of course not so fine as the French wines. The German, Kämpfer, puts Shiraz on the same level with the best Burgundy and Champagne. He who wishes to learn the nature of the wine of Shiraz should consult the Diwan of Hafiz. How far this poet speaks of wine literally understood, and how far of spiritual delights, is a matter for commentatorial investigation. Persian wine is frequently mixed with raki and saffron, and the extract of hemp. Sherbet, made of fruit juices and water, is English rather than Oriental.

Portugal.

Portugal: Peso da Regoa—Four Methods of Cultivation of Vine—White and Black Ports—The Quintas—Tarragona—Charneco. Russia: Kahetia—Gumbrinskoé. Sicily: Marsala. Spain: Malaga—Sherry—Amontillado. Switzerland: Chiavenna—St. Gall—The Canton of Vaud. Cider: Derivation—Ainsworth—Gerard—Bacon—Evelyn—Turberville—Macaulay—Phillips. Perry.

One hundred and fifty years ago, in the small town of Peso da Regoa, then called Regua only, near the confluence of the Corgo with the Douro, lived a single fisherman, in a hut which he had himself constructed. When the Oporto Wine Company was established, their warehouses were erected here, and an annual fair for the sale of wine was established.

Peso da Regoa—the Peso comes from an adjoining village—is now a thriving town, and may be considered the capital of the Alto Douro district (Paiz Vinhateiro do Alto Douro), whence are sent to England and elsewhere those wines which are here known as Port. The wine district is bounded by Villa Real on the north, Lamego on the south, S. João da Pesqueira on the east, and Mezãofrio on the west. It is unwholesome, and but thinly populated. Those who list may draw from this fact a divine prohibition of the bibbing of Port.

The vine is cultivated in Portugal in four ways. (1) By being trained round oaks or poplars de enforcado, as the Romans ulmisque adjungere vites. (2) By the terrace system, the best as (1) is the most picturesque. (3) By bushes in rows, with the intermediate ground ploughed. (4) By the trellis or de ramada. The first liquor drawn from the lagar, or press, the result of the weight of the grapes alone, is called Lacryma Christi. After that a gang of men jump into the lagar, and dance to the sound of the fife or bagpipe. The weather is warm, the work is hard; the result is better conceived than expressed.

Of white Ports the best are Muscatel de Jesus (the testimony to religious influence in this and the Lacryma Christi is extremely touching), considered the prince of all, the Dedo de Dama, the Ferral Branco, Malvazia (our Malmsey),[37] Abelhal, Agudelho, Alvaraça, Donzellinho, Folgozão, Gonveio, White Mourisco, Rabo da Ovelha, and Promissão. Of the black Ports the finest is Touriga, and the sweetest Bastardo. Other dark Ports are Souzão, the darkest of all, Aragonez, Pegudo, besides Tintas, whose names are legion. Other wines grown here, or in the immediate vicinity, are Alvarilhão, a kind of Claret, Alicante, Muscatel, Roxo, and Malvazia Vermelha. Great quantities of wine are produced in the quintas outside the line of demarcation, and some of these wines are equal to those made in the wine district of the Alto Douro itself. Red wines transformed into French Clarets at Bordeaux, are exported in large quantities. A wine from Tarragona, known as “Spanish Red,” or superb Catalan, is sent yearly to England, and sold as very full, rich, fruity, and tawny Port. Port will not keep good in the cask for more than two years without the addition of alcohol. The Oporto merchants use a pure spirit distilled from the wine itself. The old Port which we prize so highly and pay for so dearly is seldom unaffected by brandy or other spirit.

INTRODUCTION OF THE GOUT.

THE GOUT.

Some of the best wines are produced by Estremadura, such as Bucellas, Collares, Lavradio, Chamusca, Carcavellos, Barra a Barra, and many others of which not even the names are known in England. The vines round Torres Vedras might, it has been said, produce the finest wines in the world, if properly cultivated. Arinto and Estremadura are comparatively new wines. The white wines of Tojal and the vintages of Palmella and Inglezinhos have only to be known to become popular. The province of Traz-os-Montes, in spite of its climate of nove mezes de inverno, e tres de inferno, produces excellent wines in the Piaz Vinhateiro. Those in the vicinity of the river Tua and the Sabor are considered by connoisseurs to resemble the celebrated Clos Vougeot. There is a remarkable red wine called Cornifesto, and the white wines of Arêas, Bragança, Moraes, Moncorvo, and Nosedo are excellent. The cup of Charneco (2 Hen. VI. ii. 3), a wine mentioned by Beaumont and Fletcher and Decker, is said to have been made at Charneco, a village near Lisbon (European Magazine, March, 1794).

Port-wine is accredited with producing gout, and the two accompanying illustrations give the “Introduction to the Gout,” and the real fiend itself.

Russia.

Kahetia is a wine produced in a district of that name, east of Tiflis. It is of two descriptions, red and white, and is much esteemed throughout Transcaucasia. As it is kept in skins made tight with naphtha, it has generally a slight taste of leather and petroleum. Gumbrinskoé is a sweet wine grown in the Gumbri district of the Caucasus. Donskoé Champanskoé, the champagne of the Don, is said by Dr. Charnock to be a very good wine, and better than many sorts drunk in Britain. Russian wines generally, as those of many other countries, are largely diluted, and, like the majority of Greek wines, do not improve by keeping.

Sicily.

A thousand years before Christ, says Mr. Simmonds, districts of Sicily were famous for wine. The coins of Naxos (500 B.C.) bear the head of Bacchus on the obverse, on the reverse Pan, or a bunch of grapes. Of Sicilian wines, the light amber or brown wine of Marsala is best known. There is Ingham’s L.P., and Woodhouse’s; there is also the Old Brown. The Faro is perhaps the strongest wine of Sicily. The wine of Terre Forte is made near Etna, in some vineyards of Benedictine monks. Marsala, as we know it, is generally adulterated, or fortified, to use a more technical term. Even the “Virgin” has not escaped this common lot of wines. Much Marsala is indeed sold as Marsala, but much more is sold as Sherry. The wine of Taormina has the classic taste of pitch. Augusta produces a wine with a strong flavour of violets. This to some palates is the most agreeable wine drank in Sicily or elsewhere. The Del Bosco of Catania, and the Borgetto have been both recommended by the subtle taste of Dr. Charnock. A dry wine called Vin de Succo is made about ten miles from Palermo. The wine of Syracuse somewhat resembles Chablis.

Spain.

As Spain succeeds France geographically, so it follows it in the excellence of its vinous productions. Throughout all ages this country has been distinguished for its wines. But the Spaniard’s chief glory under heaven is in the preparation of white dry fortified wines such as Sherries, and sweet wines such as Malagas. In the province of Andalusia is situated Xeres de la Frontera, and the convent of Paxarete, which produces a rich sweet sparkling drink. Here, too, are the vines of the vino secco and the abocado, and Rota,[38] which produces Andalusia’s best red wines. Here are Ranico, Moguro, or Moguer, a cheap light wine, Negio, and the capital Seville. Catalonia yields a large quantity of red wine shipped to England mostly as a drink for the general. The Malaga of Granada is well known. Sherry[39] wines are, or ought to be, the products of Cadiz, including Xeres de la Frontera, San Lucar de Barrameda,—where Tintilla, an excellent Muscadine red wine, is manufactured,—Trebujena, and Puerto de Santa Maria. The celebrated wine known as Manzanilla[40] is made in San Lucar de Barrameda. Val de Peñas[41] wines are commonly red. After the perfection of age, this celebrated product of La Manche[42] is, in the opinion of Redding, equal to any red wine in the world. Much wine of Catalonia is now imported into England as Catalan Port. Borja produces a luscious white wine. The country about Tarragona on the road to Barcelona is almost wholly occupied with wine making. Beni-Carlos, La Torre, Segorbe, and Murviedro, are all fair wines of Valencia. Alicant produces an excellent red wine, vino tinto, strong and sweet; when old, this wine is called Fondellol. Vinaroz, Santo Domingo, and Perales, offer red wines of moderate excellence. The best wines of Aragon are Cariñena and the Hospital, from the vine which the French call Grenache. In Biscay, at Chacoli, a vino brozno, or austere wine, is produced in large quantity. The best is made at Vittoria, and called Pedro Ximenes.[43] Fuençaral, near Madrid, offers a good wine seldom exported. The most famous wine-growing district of Granada is that of Malaga, termed Axarquia. This produces Malagas, Muscatels, Malvasies, and Tintos. The red wines called Tinto de Rota and Sacra are unfermented with only enough spirit for preservation, and are commonly advertised in our wine circulars as “suitable for sacramental purposes.” Guindre is flavoured with cherries from which it derives its name. Into this wine, as into some others, the Spaniards are wont to put roasted pears, under the conceit that thereby it is much improved in taste and rendered more wholesome. Hence arose the proverb El vino de las peras dalo a quien bien quiéras. Malaga Xeres is often known in England as the pale, gold, dry Sherry,[44] as the wines of Alicant, Benicarlos, and Valencia are sold as a rich and fruity Port. The so-called Amontillado Sherry is very often the outcome of accident. Out of a hundred butts of Sherry from the same vineyard, some, says a great authority, will be Amontillado, without the manufacturers being able to account for it. At Cordova, a dry wine called Montilla is commonly drunk.

Switzerland.

Swiss wines are commonly consumed only in Switzerland. The best is produced in the Grisons, called Chiavenna, aromatic and white from the red grape. A white Malvasia of good quality is made in the Valais. It is luscious, as is Chiavenna. The Valais also furnishes red wines, made at La Marque and Coquempin in the district of Martigny. Schaffhausen gives plenty of red wine. The wine of blood[45] is manufactured at Basle. These wines are also known as those of the Hospital and St. Jaques. The red wines of Erlach, in Berne, are of a good quality. The red wine of Neufchâtel is equal to a third-class Burgundy. St. Gall produces tolerable wines. In the Valteline, the red wines are both good and durable, much resembling the aromatic wine of Southern France. These wines are remarkably luscious, and will, it is said, keep for a century. The largest amount of wine is produced by the Canton of Vaud. The wines of Cully and Désalés, near Lausanne, much resemble the dry wines of the Rhine.

APPLES FOR CIDER.

CIDER.

The original meaning of the word cider[46] appears to have been strong drink. It was used to designate a liquor made of the juice of any fruit pressed, and an example of the word in this use is to be found in Wycliffe’s Bible, in the speech of the angel to Zacharias (Luke i. 15), in allusion to his promised progeny: He schal not drynke wyn and syder. The next meaning is that of a liquor made from the juice of apples expressed and fermented.

“A flask of cider from his father’s vats,

Prime, which I knew.”

Tennyson: Audley Court.

We have little information about cider either from the Greeks or the Latins. It would seem that it was not known to them, if we may trust Ainsworth, who translates cider by succus e pomis expressus, and Byzantius, who gives μηλίτης (οἶνος) εἶδ. ποτοῦ as the equivalent for cidre.[47] Gerard, in his Historie of Plants, published in 1597, says that he saw in the pastures and hedgerows about the grounds of a “worshipful gentleman,” dwelling two miles from Hereford, called M. Roger Bodnome, so many trees of all sorts that the servants drunk for the most part no other drink but that which is made from apples. The quantity, says Gerard, was such that by the report of the gentleman himself, the parson “hath for tithe many hogsheads of Syder.” This reference to the servants and the parson drinking it, but not to the “gentleman,” seems to show that the liquor was not then held in much esteem.

Bacon placed cider after wine, and we have followed in our arrangement of the present volume his august example. This great philosopher speaks of cider and perry as “notable beverages on sea-voyages.” The cider of his day did not, he says, sour by crossing the line, and was good against sea-sickness. He also speaks of cider, a “wonderful pleasing and refreshing drink,” in his New Atlantis.

John Evelyn’s French Gardener gives much information on this subject, and his Pomona is, says Stopes, the first monograph on the manufacture of cider in England.

Cider is made in many parts of Barbary, and in Canada. In all the States, apples are abundant, particularly in New York and New England, and cider is a common drink of the inhabitants. And it is as excellent as it is common. That of New Jersey is generally considered the best. It is curious that the least juicy apples afford the best liquor. Cider of a superior quality is abundant in Cork, Waterford, and other counties of Ireland, where it was introduced, we are told, in the reign of Elizabeth. It was first made at Affane, in the county of Waterford.[48] Worledge’s Vinetum Britannicum, 1676, and his Most Easy Method for Making the Best Cider, 1687, have been considered at full length by Mr. Stopes. Worledge’s press is an improvement upon one shown in Evelyn’s Pomona.

Cider appears in Russia under the name of Kvas. There is Yàblochni kvas, made of apples; Grùshevoi kvas, of pears, a perry; and Malinovoi kvas, of raspberries. George Turberville, secretary to the English Embassy to Moscow in the year 1568, mentions kvas in a description of the Russians of his time as:—

“Folk fit to be of Bacchus’ train, so quaffing is their kind;

Drink is their whole desire, the pot is all their pride.

The soberest head doth once a day stand needful of a guide.

If he to banquet bid his friends, he will not shrink

On them at dinner to bestow a dozen kinds of drink,

Such liquor as they have, and as the country gives;

But chiefly two, one called kwas, whereby the Moujike lives,

Small ware and waterlike, but somewhat tart in taste;

The rest is mead, of honey made, wherewith their lips they baste.”

Stopes is of opinion that the finest cider is made, not in the west, as has been commonly asserted, but in the east of England. This authority seems particularly to favour the Ribston pippins of Norfolk.

“Worcester,” says Macaulay, in his History of England, ch. iii., “is the queen of the cider land;” but Devon and Somerset, Gloucester and Norfolk, might dispute the title. To make good cider the apples should be quite ripe, as the amount of sugar in ripe apples is 11·0; in unripe apples, 4·9; in over-ripe apples, 7·95. The fermentation should proceed slowly. Brande says that the strongest cider contains, in 100 volumes, 9·87 of alcohol of 92 per cent; the weakest, 5·21. By distillation, cider produces a good spirit; but it is seldom converted to that purpose in consequence of its acidity, which, however, is greatly remedied by rectification.

Much cider is distilled in Normandy, and sent to this country under the name of arrack, or some other foreign spirit, according to its flavour. To the Normans the invention of this liquor has been attributed. They are also said to have received it from the Moors. Whitaker (Hist. Manchester, i. 321) says this drink was introduced into this country by the Romans; and Simmonds (p. 25) that it was first used in England about 1284.

AN OLD CIDER MILL.

Cider has been immortalised by Phillips in a classical poem, in imitation of Virgil’s Georgics, which, according to Johnson, “need not shun the presence of the original.” Milton’s nephew thought that cider—

“far surmounts

Gallic or Latin grapes.”

Perry.

Perry is prepared from pears, as cider from apples. It is capable of being used in the adulteration of champagne.[49] The harsher, redder, and more tawny pears produce the best drink. Perry is less popular than cider, but some consider it superior.[50]

BRANDY.

The Invention of Brandy—Early Alchemists—Aqua Vitæ—Distillation—The Still-room—Ladies Drinking—Nantes and Charente—Johnson’s Idea of Brandy—The Charente District—Manufacture of Brandy—The Cognac Firms.

Who invented Brandy? is a question that cannot be authoritatively answered offhand; but the good people of some parts of Germany hold that it was the Devil. And their legend is, at all events, circumstantial.

Every one who is at all acquainted with old legends is fully aware that the Father of Evil is extremely simple, and has allowed himself, many times, to be outwitted by man. Once, especially, he was so guileless as to put trust in a Steinbach man, who cajoled him into entering an old beech tree, and there he was imprisoned until the tree was cut down. His first step, on regaining his freedom, was to revisit his own particular dominion, which, to his horror, he found empty!

This, naturally, would not do, and he set about re-peopling hell without delay. He thought the quickest plan would be to start a distillery; so he hurried off at once to Nordhausen, where his manufacture of Brandy (his own invention) became so famous that people from all parts came to him to learn the new art, and to become distillers. From that time his Satanic Majesty has never had to complain of paucity of subjects.

It seems fairly established that the famous chemist Geber, who lived in the 7th or 8th century, was acquainted with distillation, and we know that it was practised by the Arabian and Saracenic alchemists, but have no knowledge whether they made any practical use of the alcohol they produced. They, at all events, gave us the word by which we now know the spirit, or ethereal part, of wine.

Alcohol, distilled from wine, is first reliably mentioned by a celebrated French alchemist and physician, Arnaud de Villeneuve, who died in 1313, who gave it the name of aqua vitæ, or water of life,[51] and regarded it as a valuable adjunct in physic, and as a boon to humanity. Raymond Lully, the famous alchemist, who is said to have been his pupil, declared it to be “an emanation from the Deity,” and on its introduction it was supposed to be the elixir of life, capable of rejuvenating those who partook of it, and, as such, was only purchasable at an extremely high price.

We may see, by a book[52] written 200 years after the death of Arnaud de Villeneuve, the esteem in which Aqua Vitæ was held even after so great a lapse of time.

Aqua Vite is comonly called the mastresse of al medycynes, for it easeth the dysseases comynge of colde. It gyveth also yonge corage in a person, and cawseth hym to have a good memorye and remembraunce. It puryfyeth the fyve wittes of melancolye and of unclenes whan it is dronke by reason and measure. That is to understande fyve or syx droppes in the mornynge lastyng with a sponefull of wyne, usynge the same in the maner aforsayde the evyl humours can not hurte the body, for it withdryveth them oute of the vaynes.

¶ It conforteth the harte, and causeth a body to be mery.

¶ It heleth all olde and newe sores on the hede comynge of colde, whan the hede is enoynted therwyth and a lytell of the same water holden in the mouthe, and dronke of the same.

¶ It causeth a good colour in a parson whan it is dronke and the hede enoynted therwyth the space of xx dayes; it heleth Alopicia, or whan it is dronke lastyng with a lytell tryacle. It causeth the here well to growe, and kylleth the lyce and flees.

¶ It cureth the Reuma of the hede, whan the temples and the fore hede therwith be rubbed.

¶ It cureth Litargiam,[53] and all yll humours of the hede.

¶ It heleth the coloure in the face, and all maner of pymples. It heleth the fystule when it is put therein with the Juce of Celendyne.

¶ Cotton wet in the same and a lytell wronge out agayn and so put in the eares at nyght goynge to bedde, and a lytell dronke thereof, is good against all defnes.

¶ It easeth the payn in the teethe, when it is a longe tyme holden in the mouthe, it causeth a swete brethe, and theleth the rottyng tethe.

¶ It heleth the canker in the mouthe, in the teethe, in the lyppes, and in the tongue, whan it is longe time holden in the mouthe.

¶ It cawseth the hevy togue to become light and wel spekyng.

¶ It heleth the shorte brethe whan it is droke with water wheras the figes be soden in, and vanisheth al flemmes.

¶ It causeth good dygestynge and appetyte for to eat, and taketh away all bolkynge.[54]

¶ It dryveth the wyndes out of the body, and is good agaynst the evyll stomake.

¶ It easeth the fayntenes of the harte, the payn of the mylte, the yelowe Jandis, the dropsy, the yll lymmes, the goute, in the handes and in the fete, the payne in the brestes whan they be swollen, and heleth al diseases in the bladder, and breaketh the stone.

¶ It withdryveth venym that hath been taken in meat or in drynke, whā a lytell tryacle is put therto.

¶ It heleth the flanckes[55] and all dyseases coming of colde.

¶ It heleth the brennyng of the body, and of al membres whan it is rubbed therewith by the fyre viii dayes contynnynge.

¶ It is good to be dronke agaynst the sodeyn dede.

¶ It heleth all scabbes of the body, and all colde swellynges, enoynted or washed therwith, and also a lytell thereof dronke.

¶ It heleth all shronke sinewes, and causeth them to become softe and right.

¶ It heleth the febres tertiana and quartana, when it is dronke an houre before, or the febres becometh on a body.

¶ It heleth the venymous bytes, and also of a madde dogge, whan they be wasshed therwith.

¶ It heleth all stynkyng woundes whan they be wasshed therwith.”

From use in medicine, Aqua Vitæ soon came into domestic use, and here is given one of Iherom Bruynswyke’s “Styllatoryes,” which he says was the “comon fornays” which was “well beknowen amonge the potters, made of erthe leded or glased, and it may be removed from the one place to the other.”

It was in a still of this sort that the old housewives of the sixteenth and succeeding centuries used to concoct their strong and cordial waters—a practice which has given, and left to, our own times, the name of “Still-room,” as the housekeeper’s own particular domain. They experimented on almost every herb that grew, and some of their concoctions must have been exceedingly nasty. Yet some of their recipes read as if they were comforting, and they were not deficient in variety.

Heywood, in his Philocothonista, or The Drunkard, Opened, Dissected, and Anatomized, 1635, p. 48, mentions some of them. “To add to these chiefe and multiplicitie of wines before named, yet there be Stills and Limbecks going, swetting out Aqua Vitæ and strong waters deriving their names from Cynamon, Lemmons, Balme, Angelica, Aniseed, Stomach Water, Hunni, etc. And to fill up the number, we have plenty of Vsque-ba’ha.”

The old housewives’ books of the latter end of the sixteenth century, until much later, are still in existence, and from them we may learn many drinks of our forefathers, how to make Ipocras (very good, especially when taken in a “Loving Cup”), to clarify Whey, to make Buttered Beer, Sirrop of Roses or Violets, Rosa Solis, a Caudle for an old Man, or to distil Spirits of Spices, Spirits of Wine tasting of what Vegetable you please, Balme Water, Rosemary Water, Sinamon Water, Aqua Rubea, Spirits of Hony, Rose Water, Vinegar, very many scents, and a distillation called Aqua Composita, which entered into many receipts. There are many formulæ for this, but Bruynswyke gives the following:—

“AQUA VITE COMPOSITA.

“The same water is made some time of wyne with spyces onely, sometyme with wyne and rotes of the herbes, sometyme with the herbes, some tyme with the rotes and herbes togyder, for at all tymes thereto must be stronge wyne.

“Take a gallon of strong Gascoigne wine, and Sage, Mints, Red Roses, Time, Pellitorie, Rosemarie, Wild Thime, Camomil, Lavender, of eche an handfull. These herbes shal be stamped all togyder in a Morter, and then putte it in a clene vessell and do herto a pynte of Rose Water, and a quart of romney,[56] and then stoppe it close and let it stand so iii or iiii dayes. Whan ye have so done, put all this togyder in a styllatory and dystyll water of the same; than take your dystylled water, and pore it upon the herbes agayne into the styllatory, and strewe upon it these powders followynge.

¶ Fyrst cloves and cynamon, of eche an halfe ounce, Oryous[57] an ounce, and a few Maces, nutmeggs halfe an ounce, a lytell saffran, muscus, spica nardi, ambre, and some put campher in it, bycawse the materyals be so hote. Stere[58] all the same well togyder and dystylle it clene of, tyll it come fat lyke oyle, than set awaye your water, and let it be wel kepte. After that make a stronge fyre, and dystyll oyle of it, and receyve it in a fyole,[59] this oyle smelleth above all oyles, and he that letteth one droppe fall on his hande, it will perce through. It is wonderfull good, excellynge many other soveraygne oyles to dyvers dysseases.”

Although the Still-room was serviceable for medicinal purposes, yet, as we have seen, there were many comforting drinks made, including Vsquebath, or Irish aqua vitæ (a recipe for which we will give in its proper place), and doubtless this contributed much towards the tippling habit of some ladies in the 17th and 18th centuries. We hear somewhat of this in the reign of good Queen Anne (who, by the bye, was irreverently termed “Brandy-faced Nan”), when they used to make, and drink, Ratifia of Apricocks, Fenouillette of Rhé, Millefleurs, Orangiat, Burgamot, Pesicot, and Citron Water, etc., etc., numerous allusions to which are made in the pages of “The Spectator,” and other literature of the times. Edward Ward, who had no objection to call a spade, a spade, thus plainly speaks out.[60]

“It would make a Man smile to behold her Figure in a front Box, where her twinkling Eyes, by her Afternoon’s Drams of Ratifee and cold Tea, sparkle more than her Pendants.... Her closet is always as well stor’d with Juleps, Restoratives, and Strong Waters, as an Apothecary’s Shop, or a Distiller’s Laboratory; and is, herself, so notable a Housewife in the Art of preparing them, that she has a larger Collection of Chemical Receipts than a Dutch Mountebank.... As soon as she rises, she must have a Salutary Dram to keep her Stomach from the Cholick; a Whet before she eats, to procure Appetite; after eating, a plentiful Dose for Concoction; and to be sure a Bottle of Brandy under her Bed side for fear of fainting in the Night.”

There is no necessity to multiply instances of the feminine liking for brandy, for everyone finds numerous examples in his reading, from Juliet’s nurse,[61] who, after Tybalt’s death, says, “Give me some aqua vitæ,” to old Lady Clermont, of whom Grantley Berkeley tells the following story[62]:—

“Prominent among my earliest Brighton reminiscences are those of old Lady Clermont, who was a frequent guest at the Pavilion. Her physician had recommended a moderate use of stimulants, to supply that energy which was deficient in her system, and brandy had been suggested in a prescribed quantity, to be mixed with her tea. I remember well having my curiosity excited by this, to me, novel form of taking medicine, and holding on by the back of a chair to watch the modus operandi. Very much to my astonishment, the patient held a liqueur bottle over a cup of tea, and began to pour out its contents, with a peculiar purblind look, upon the back of a teaspoon. Presently, she seemed suddenly to become aware of what she was about, turned up the spoon the right way, and carefully measured, and added the quantity to which she had been restricted. The Tea, so strongly ‘laced,’ she now drank with great apparent gusto.”

We derive our name of Brandy from the Dutch brand-wijn, or the German brannt-wein, that is, burnt or distilled wine; and in the 17th and 18th centuries it was generally spelt, and spoken of as brandy wine. But, also, in those centuries was it known by the name of “Nantz,” from the town (Nantes, the capital of the Loire Inferieure) whence it came. But this name was changed early last century, when the trade left Nantes, and got into the Charente district, of which Cognac was the centre; so what used to be “right good Nantz” of the old smuggling days, turned into the delicate, many-starred “Cognac” of our times.

It was an eminently respectable spirit. Whiskey was practically unknown out of Scotland and Ireland. Gin was the drink of the common people, and rum was considered only fit for sailors. Even Dr. Johnson, though so fond of his tea, was also fond of brandy, as Boswell chronicles of him, when in his 70th year: “On Wednesday, April 7, I dined with him at Sir Joshua Reynolds’s. Johnson harangued upon the qualities of different liquors; and spoke with great contempt of claret, as so weak, that ‘a man would be drowned by it, before it made him drunk.’ He was persuaded to drink one glass of it, that he might judge, not from recollection, which might be dim, but from immediate sensation. He shook his head, and said, ‘Poor stuff! No, sir, claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero’ (smiling) ‘must drink brandy. In the first place the flavour of brandy is the most grateful to the palate, and then brandy will do soonest for a man what drinking can do for him. There are, indeed, few who are able to drink brandy. That is a power rather to be wished for than attained.’”

And two years later on he gives another illustration of the doctor’s liking for strong potations. “Mr. Eliot mentioned a curious liquor peculiar to his country, which the Cornish fishermen drink. They call it Mahogany; and it is made of two parts gin and one part treacle, well beaten together. I begged to have some of it made, which was done with proper skill by Mr. Eliot. I thought it very good liquor, and said it was a counterpart of what is called Athol porridge[63] in the Highlands of Scotland, which is a mixture of whiskey and honey. Johnson said ‘That must be a better liquor than the Cornish, for both its component parts are better.’ He also observed, ‘Mahogany must be a modern name; for it is not long since the wood called mahogany was known in this country. I mentioned his scale of liquors: Claret for boys—port for men—brandy for heroes. ‘Then,’ said Mr. Burke, ‘let me have claret; I love to be a boy; to have the careless gaiety of boyish days,’ Johnson: ‘I should drink claret too, if it would give me that; but it does not; it neither makes boys men, nor men boys. You’ll be drowned in it before it has any effect upon you.’”

But it was the spirit always drunk by gentlemen until well on in this century, as we see by Mr. Pickwick, whose constant resource in all cases of difficulty, was a glass of brandy. Pale brandy was not so much drank as brown, which is now only taken, when very old, as a liqueur, although a brown brandy of very dubious quality is to be met with in some country public houses. Brandy, like every other spirit, developes its ethers with age, gets mellower, and of exquisite flavour; and its popularity would undoubtedly be revived if the drinker were only sure he could get such brandy as the many starred brands of Hennessy and Martell, instead of that awful substitute so often given—British brandy, made of raw potato spirit.

The soil of the Charente slope is particularly adapted to the growth of the vine, although, as in all vine-growing countries some districts, and even small patches of land, produce finer wine than others. The grapes are white, not much larger than good-sized currants, and the vines seldom bear fruit until four or five years from their planting, and are most vigorous at the age of from ten to thirty. Many bear well up to fifty and seventy, and some are fruitful at one hundred years or more.

As a rule, the large firms do not distil the brandy they sell, but leave that operation to the small farmers round about, and then blend their products; as, to produce the quantity they sell, enormous distilling space would be necessary, wine only producing one-eighth or one-tenth of alcohol to its bulk. The farmer’s distillery is very primitive; merely a simple boiler with a head or receiver, and a worm surrounded with cold water. There are generally two of these stills at work, and when once the farmer commences making his brandy, he keeps on day and night, bivouacking near the stills, until he has converted all his wine into crude spirit, as colourless as water, which he carts off, just as it is, to the brandy factory for sale. There it is tasted, measured, and put into new casks of oak, hooped round with chestnut wood. These casks are branded with the date, together with the quality and place of growth of the wine from which the brandy was distilled, and they remain some time in stock before their contents are blended in the proportions which the firm deem suitable.

This new spirit is housed on a floor over large vats, which are filled from selected casks, the spirit being filtered through flannel discs on its way. This mixes the various growths pretty well, but the spirit is run into other vats, being forced through filters of a peculiar kind of paper, almost like paste-board. When it gets to the second series of vats, it is kept well stirred, to prevent the heavier spirit sinking to the bottom. It is then drawn off into casks, which are bunged up, and stored for several years that the brandy may mature, and that the fusel oil may develope into the ethyls, which give such flavour and fragrance to the brandy.

Perhaps the oldest house in the Cognac district is Hennessy’s, but it would be invidious to say that their brandy was superior either to Martell’s, Otard and Dupuy’s, the Société Vignicole, Courvoisier, or many other firms. That must be left to individual taste. But from these firms we can rely on having pure unadulterated brandies, the pure product of the vine, without any admixture of grain or beet spirit. At one time, adulteration was rife among the farmers, but in 1857 and 1858 several of them were prosecuted, and they are now credited with having abjured their evil ways.

J. A.

GIN.

Massinger’s Duke of Milan—Pope’s Epilogue to Satires—The Dunciad—William III.—Lord Hervey—Sir R. Walpole—The Fall of Madame Geneva—Hogarth’s Gin Lane—Schiedam Adulteration—Gin Sling—Captain Dudley Bradstreet—Tom and Jerry Hawthorn.

Gin is an alcoholic drink distilled from malt or from unmalted barley or other grain, and afterwards rectified and flavoured. The word is French, genièvre, juniper, corrupted into Geneva, and subsequently into its present form. It is to the berries of the juniper that the best Hollands owes its flavour.

Perhaps one of the earliest allusions to gin is in Massinger’s Duke of Milan (1623), Act I., scene i., when Graccho, a creature of Mariana, says to the courtier Julio, of a chance drunkard,

“Bid him sleep;

’Tis a sign he has ta’en his liquor, and if you meet

An officer preaching of sobriety,

Unless he read it in Geneva print,

Lay him by the heels.”

In this extract the word is played upon, Geneva suggesting both the habit of spirit-drinking and Calvinistic doctrine.

When Pope wrote, the corrupted word “Gin” had become common. In the Epilogue to the Satires, I. 130.

“Vice thus abused, demands a nation’s care;

This calls the Church to deprecate our sin,

And hurls the thunder of our laws on gin.”

Pope has added a note to this passage, to the effect that gin had almost destroyed the lowest rank of the people before it was restrained by Parliament in 1736.

Another early allusion to Geneva is to be found in Carmina Quadragesimalia, Oxford, 1723, vol. i., p. 7, in a copy of verses contributed by Salusbury Cade, elected from Westminster to Ch. Ch. in 1714.

The thesis of which Salusbury Cade maintained the affirmative, is whether life consists in heat, or in the original An vita consistat in calore?

“Dum tremula hyberno Dipsas superimminet igni

Et dextra cyathum sustinet, ore tubum,

Alternis vicibus fumos hauritque, bibitque,

Quam dat arundo sitim grata Geneva levat.

Languenti hic ingens stomacho est fultura, nec alvus

Nunc Hypochondriacis flatibus ægra tumet.

Liberior fluit in tepido nunc corpore sanguis,

Hinc nova vis membris et novus inde calor.

Si quando audieris vetulam hanc periisse: Genevæ

Dicas ampullam non renovasse suam.”

Which being Englished, is

“Dipsas, who shivers by her wintry fire,

While her pipe’s smoke ascends in spire on spire,

Alternate puffs and drinks—Geneva lays

That thirst the weed is wont in her to raise.

With this her belly propped, its pain expels;

Intestine wind no more her stomach swells;

A freer blood runs leaping through her frame,

New heat, new strength recalls the ancient game.

And should you hear she’s dead, the cause you’ll know

Was that Geneva in her jug ran low.”

In the Dunciad, which Pope wrote in 1726 (book iii., l. 143), we read,—

“A second see, by meeker manners known,

And modest as the maid that sips alone;

From the strong fate of drams if thou get free,

Another D’Urfey, Ward! shall sing in thee!

Thee shall each ale-house, thee each gill-house[64] mourn,

And answering gin-shops sourer sighs return.”

An early allusion to Geneva is in a poem by Alexander Blunt, Distiller, 8vo, 1729, price 6d., called “Geneva,” addressed to the Right Honourable Sir R⸺ W⸺. It commences,

“Thy virtues, O Geneva! yet unsung

By ancient or by modern bard, the muse

In verse sublime shall celebrate. And thou

O W⸺ statesman most profound! vouchsafe

To lend a gracious ear: for fame reports

That thou with zeal assiduous dost attempt

Superior to Canary or Champaigne

Geneva salutiferous to enhance;

To rescue it from hand of porter vile,

And basket woman, and to the bouffet

Of lady delicate and courtier grand

Exalt it; well from thee may it assume

The glorious modern name of royal Bob!”

Though “Brandy cognac, Jamaica Rum, and costly Arrack” are alluded to, there is no mention of Hollands in the poem, which is a defence of Geneva against ale.

In this poem a statement is contained that Geneva was introduced by William III., and that he himself drank it.

“Great Nassau,

Immortal name! Britain’s deliverer

From slavery, from wooden shoes and chains,

Dungeons and fire; attendants on the sway

Of tyrants bigotted and zeal accurst,

Of holy butchers, prelates insolent,

Despotic and bloodthirsty! He who did

Expiring liberty revive (who wrought

Salvation wondrous!) God-like hero! He

It was, who to compleat our happiness

With liberty, restored Geneva introduced.

O Britons. O my countrymen can you

To glorious William now commence ingrates

And spurn his ashes? Can you vilify

The sovereign cordial he has pointed out,

Which by your own misconduct only can

Prove detrimental? Martial William drank

Geneva, yet no age could ever boast

A braver prince than he. Within his breast

Glowed every royal virtue! Little sign,

O Genius of malt liquor! that Geneva

Debilitates the limbs and health impairs

And mind enervates. Men for learning famed

And skill in medicine prescribed it then

Frequent in recipe, nor did it want

Success to recommend its virtues vast

To late posterity.”

In 1736 Lord Hervey, describing the state of England, says: The drunkenness of the common people was so universal by the retailing a liquor called Gin, with which they could get drunk for a groat, that the whole town of London and many towns in the country swarmed with drunken people from morning till night, and were more like a scene of a Bacchanal than the residence of a civil society.

Retailers exhibited placards in their windows, intimating that people might get drunk for the sum of 1d. and that clean straw would be provided for customers in the most comfortable of cellars.

On Feb. 20, 1736, in the ninth year of George II., a petition of the Justices of the Peace for Middlesex against the excessive use of spirituous liquors was presented to the House of Commons, setting forth: That the drinking of Geneva and other distilled spirituous liquors had greatly increased, especially among the people of inferior rank, that the constant and excessive use thereof had destroyed thousands of his Majesty’s subjects, debauching their morals, etc., that the “pernicious liquor” was then sold not only by the distillers and Geneva shops, but many other persons of inferior trades, “by which means journeymen, apprentices and servants were drawn in to taste, and by degrees to like, approve, and immoderately to drink thereof,” and that the petitioners therefore prayed that the House would take the premises into their serious consideration, etc. The House having resolved itself into a committee on Feb. 23, Sir Joseph Jekyll moved the following resolutions: (1) That the low price of spirituous liquors is the principal inducement to the excessive and pernicious use thereof. (2) That a discouragement should be given to their use by a duty. (3) That the vending, etc., of such liquors be restrained to persons keeping public brandy-shops, victualling houses, coffee houses, ale houses and inn-holders, and to such apothecaries and surgeons as should make use of the same by way of medicine only; and, (4) That no person keeping a public brandy-shop, etc., should be permitted to vend, etc., such liquors, but by licence with duty payable thereon. These Resolutions were agreed on without debate.

On March 8, Mr. William Pulteney affixed a duty of 20s. per gallon on gin, on the grounds of ancient use and sanction, and of its reducing many thousands of families at once to a state of despair.

Sir Robert Walpole had no immediate concern in the laying of this tax on spirituous liquors, but suffered therefrom much unmerited obloquy. The bill was presented by Jekyll from a spirit of philanthropy, which led him to contemplate with horror the progress of vice that marked the popular attachment to this inflammatory poison. The populace showed their disapprobation of this Act in their usual fashion of riot and violence. We are told in Coxe’s Walpole that numerous desperados continued the clandestine sale of gin in defiance of every restriction.

The duty of 20s. per gallon was repealed 16 Geo. II., c. 8. On the 28th of September, 1736, it was deemed necessary to send a detachment of sixty soldiers from Kensington to protect the house of Sir Joseph Jekyll, the Master of the Rolls, in Chancery Lane, from the violence threatened by the populace against this eminent lawyer. Two soldiers with their bayonets fixed were planted as sentinels at the little door next Chancery Lane, and the great doors were shut up, the rest of the soldiers kept garrison in the stables in the yard.

This agitation gave rise to many a ballad and broadside, such as the “Fall of Bob,” or the “Oracle of Gin,” a tragedy; and “Desolation, or the Fall of Gin,” a poem.

The Lamentable Fall of Madame Geneva.—29 Sept., 1736.[65]

The Woman holds a song to yᵉ tune to yᵉ Children in yᵉ Wood.

“Good lack, good lack, and Well-a-day,

That Madame Gin should fall:

Superior Powers she must obey.

This Act will starve us all.”

The Man has the second part to yᵉ same tune.

“Th’ Afflicted she has caus’d to sing,

The Cripple leap and dance;

All those who die for love of Gin

Go to Heaven in a Trance.”

Underneath are the following verses—

“The Scene appears, and Madame’s Crew

In deep Despair, Exposed to view.

See Tinkers, Cobblers, and cold Watchmen,

With B⸺s and W⸺s as drunk as Dutchmen.

All mingling with the Common Throng,

Resort to hear her Passing Song.

“Whilst Mirth suppress’d by Parliament,

In Sober Sadness all lament,

Pursued by Jekyl’s indignation,

She’s brought to utter desolation.

With Oaths they storm their Monarch’s name,

And curse their Hands that form’d the Scheme.

“All Billingsgate their Case Bemoan,

And Rag-fair Change in Mourning’s hung;

Queen Gin, for whom they’d sacrifice

Their Shirts and Smocks, nay, both their Eyes.

Rather than She want Contribution,

They’d trudge the Streets without their shoes on.”

The following verses on the Gin Act, in 1736, are supposed by John Nichols to be the production of Dr. Johnson.

“Pensilibus fusis cyatho comitata supremo,

Terribili fremitu stridula mæret anus.

O longum formosa vale mihi vita decusque,

Fida comes mensæ fida comesque tori!

Eheu quam longo tecum consumerer ævo,

Heu quam tristitiæ dulce lenimen eras.

Æternum direpta mihi, sed quid moror istis,

Stat, fixum est, nequeunt jam revocare preces;

I, quoniam sic fata vocant, liceat mihi tantum,

Vivere te viva te moriente mori.”

A clever cento from the Latin poets, which may be thus represented in English:—

“... Left with her last glass alone,

Thus loud laments her lot, the squeaking crone:

Farewell, my life and beauty, thou art sped,

Faithful companion of my board and bed!

My earthly term fain with thee would I live,

Who to my sorrowing heart can’st solace give.

Bereft of gin, alas! am I for aye!

The Act is passed. ’Tis all in vain to pray.

Go where the Fates may call, and know that I

Living, with thee would live, and dying, die!”

Hogarth’s Gin Lane was advertised in 1751, with a note that, as its subject was calculated to reform some reigning vices peculiar to the lower class of people, in hopes to render them of more extensive use, the author had published them in the cheapest manner possible. “The cheapest manner possible” was one shilling which in those days was a fairly good price for a print. The following lame and defamatory verse was composed for the occasion by the Rev. James Townley:—

“Gin Lane.

Gin, cursed fiend, with fury fraught,

Makes human race a prey;

It enters by a deadly draught,

And steals our life away.

Virtue and Truth, driven to despair,

Its rage compels to fly;

But cherishes, with hellish care,

Theft, murder, perjury.

Damned cup, that on the vitals preys,

That liquid fire contains;

Which madness to the heart conveys,

And rolls it through the veins.”

Hogarth tells us that in Gin Lane every circumstance of the horrid effects of gin drinking is brought to view in terrorem. Idleness, poverty, misery, and distress, which drives even to madness and death, are the only objects that are to be seen; and not a house in tolerable condition but the pawnbrokers and gin shop. The same moral is taught by Cruikshank, but not before his conversion to teetotalism.

Schiedam is the metropolis of gin, and its numerous distilleries are omnivorous, taking with equal relish cargoes of rye and buckwheat from Russia, and damaged rice or any cereal from other countries, and sometimes also potato spirit from Hamburg.

The distillery of De Kuypers is probably that of the greatest note, and that firm’s black square bottles, packed in cases filled with hemp husks, are known all over the world. In Africa “square face” is king, but he frequently holds some counterfeit liquor, even sometimes the vilest of Cape Smoke.

Schiedam is the Mecca of the Dutchman, the birthplace of his beloved Schnapps. This drink is always acceptable, and fifty good reasons exist for drinking it.

The chief varieties of the aromatised popular spirit called gin are now known as Geneva, Hollands, and Schiedam. It is current in some parts of Africa as a species of coin.

Since, however, every distiller varies his materials and their proportions, the species of this beverage are practically unlimited. Generally, however, the distinction is clear between Hollands or Dutch and English gin. The former is commonly purer than the highly flavoured and too frequently adulterated British product.

The matters employed in the adulteration are very many. Corianders, crushed almond cake, angelica root powdered, liquorice, cardamoms, cassia, cinnamon, grains of paradise, and cayenne pepper, and many more substances take the place of the berries of the juniper tree. As these substances frequently produce a cloudy appearance, the liquid is subsequently refined by other adulterants, such as alum, sulphate of zinc, and acetate of lead.

The variety of gin dear to ancient beldams, which is known as Cordial, is more highly sweetened and aromatized than the ordinary quality.

The alcoholic strength of gin as commonly sold ranges from 22 to 48 degrees. The amount of sugar varies between 2 and 9 per cent.

Gin is a beneficial diuretic, but the compounds sold under that name are too often detrimental in their effects.

A popular drink called gin-sling takes its name from John Collins, formerly a celebrated waiter in Limmer’s old house. The old lines on this drink ran as follows:—

“My name is John Collins, head waiter at Limmer’s,

Corner of Conduit Street, Hanover Square.

My chief occupation is filling of brimmers

For all the young gentlemen frequenters there.”

The poetry is very far from bad, and so was the liquor. It was a composition of gin, soda water, lemon, and sugar. John was abbreviated to gin and Collins to sling.

Gin has had many popular names, but why gin should be called Old Tom by the publicans and lower orders of London has sometimes puzzled those who are inquisitive enough to consider the subject etymologically. The answer may, perhaps, be found in a curious book, called “The Life and Uncommon Adventures of Captain Dudley Bradstreet, Dublin, 1755.” Captain Dudley, a government spy of the Count Fathom species, after declaring that the selling of Geneva in a less quantity than two gallons had been prohibited, says: “Most of the gaols were full, on account of this Act, and it occurred to me to venture upon the trade. I got an acquaintance to rent a house in Blue Anchor Alley, in St. Luke’s parish, who privately conveyed his bargain to me: I then got it well secured, and laid out in a bed and other furniture five pounds, in provision and drink that would keep, about two pounds, and purchased in Moorfields the sign of a cat and had it nailed to a street window. I then caused a leaden pipe, the small end out about an inch, to be placed under the paw of the cat, the end that was within had a funnel to it.

“When my house was ready for business I inquired what distiller in London was most famous for good gin, and was assured by several that it was Mr. L⸺dale, in Holborn.[66] To him I went, and laid out thirteen pounds.... The cargo was sent to my house, at the back of which there was a way to go in or out. When the liquor was properly disposed, I got a person to inform a few of the mob that gin would be sold by the cat at my window next day, provided they put the money in his mouth, from whence there was a hole which conveyed it to me.” This, by the way, is a rare anticipation of our automatic sweetstuff, scent, and other machines. To continue: “At night I took possession of my den, and got up early next morning to be ready for custom. It was over three hours before anybody called, which made me almost despair of the project; at last I heard the chink of money and a comfortable voice say, ‘Puss, give me two pennyworth of gin!’ I instantly put my mouth to the tube and bid them receive it from the pipe under her paw”—the cat seems to have changed its sex in this short interval of time—“and then measured and poured it into the funnel, from whence they soon received it. Before night I took six shillings, the next day about thirty shillings, and afterwards three or four pounds a day. From all parts of London people used to resort to me in such numbers that my neighbours could scarcely get in and out of their houses. After this manner I went on for a month, in which time I cleared upwards of two-and-twenty pounds.”

So far Captain Bradstreet, “but,” says the Editor of Notes & Queries, “the ghost of ‘old Tom Hodges’ will probably enter a protest against Captain Bradstreet’s cat.”

Another popular name for gin was used when Corinthian Tom and Jerry Hawthorn visited Bob Logic in the Fleet. Bob says, “Let us spend the day comfortably, and in the evening I will introduce you both to my friend the haberdasher. He is a good whistler,[67] and his shop always abounds with some prime articles that you will like to look at....” A glass or two of wine made them as gay as larks, and a hint from Jerry to Logic about the whistler brought them into the shop of the latter in a twinkling.

Hawthorne, with great surprise, said, “Where are we? This is no haberdasher’s. It’s a ⸺”

“No nosing, Jerry,” replied Logic, with a grin; “you’re wrong, the man is a dealer in tape.”

WHISKEY.

Uisge-beatha—“My Stint”—Its Manufacture—Good and Bad—Early Mentions of Whiskey—Materials used in its Manufacture—St. Thorwald—Duncan Forbes and Ferrintosh—Duty on Whiskey—Silent Spirit—Artificial Maturing.

No matter in what country, wherever it was known, alcohol has been hailed as the Water of Life, even in the Gaelic. Uisge-beatha, or, as we term it, whiskey, bears literally that interpretation. This is “the wine of the country,” both in Ireland and Scotland, and the quantities drank, without any apparently hurtful effect, is astonishing to a southern Englishman. Northwards, on the border land, it is a question whether more whiskey is not drunk, pro rata, than in Scotland.

Still, even there, every one is not gifted, as was the Irishman spoken of by John Wilson Croker. He tells the story of a lawsuit, in which a life insurance company disputed a claim, on the ground that the death was caused by excessive drinking. One witness for the plaintiff was called, who deposed that, for the last eighteen years of his life, he had been in the nightly habit of imbibing twenty-four tumblers of whiskey punch. The cross-examining counsel wished to know whether he would swear to that, or whether he ever overstepped that limit. The witness replied that he was upon his oath, and would swear no farther; “for I never kept count beyond the two dozen, though there is no saying how many beyond I might drink to make myself comfortable; but that’s my stint.”

Good whiskey should be made solely from the finest barley malt, and is so made by the largest and best distillers; but the smaller ones, and those who are in a hurry to get rich by any means, use all kinds of refuse grain, and produce a spirit which, if drank new, is neither more nor less than rank poison. The fusel oil, which is present in all distillations from grain, requires time to resolve itself into those delicate ethers, which, while enhancing the flavour and bouquet of the spirit, are harmless. Good whiskey, properly matured, mixed with a sufficient quantity of water, and used in moderation, is a good and a wholesome drink, acting also in lieu of food.

When this life-giving liquor was discovered is uncertain. Edward Campion, in his History of Ireland, 1633, speaking of a famine which happened in 1316, says that it was caused by the soldiers eating flesh and drinking aqua vitæ in Lent; and, in another place, he states that a knight, called Savage, who lived in 1350, having prepared an army against the Irish, allowed to every soldier, before he buckled with the enemy, a mighty draught of aqua vitæ, wine, or old ale.

Walter Harris, in his Hibernica, 1757, says that in the reign of Henry VIII. it was decreed that there be but one maker of aqua vitæ in every borough town, upon pain of 6s. 8d.; and that no wheaten malt go to any Irishman’s country, upon pain of forfeiture of the same in value, except only bread, ale, or aqua vitæ.

In a little book, Delightes for Ladies, etc., 1602, is the following recipe for Usquebath, or Irish Aqua Vitæ:—

“To every gallon of good Aqua Composita, put two ounces of chosen liquerice, bruised and cut into small peeces, but first clensed from all his filth, and two ounces of Annis seeds that are cleane and bruised. Let them macerate five or six daies in a wodden Vessel, stopping the same close, and then draw off as much as will runne cleere, dissolving in that cleare Aqua Vitæ five or six spoonfuls of the best Malassoes you can get; Spanish cute, if you can get it, is thought better than Malassoes; then put this into another vessell; and after three or foure daies (the more the better), when the liquor hath fined itself, you may use the same; some add Dates and Raisons of the Sun to this receipt: those groundes which remaine, you may redistill, and make more Aqua Composita of them, and of that Aqua Composita you may make more Usquebath.”

The distillation of whiskey in Ireland, on a large scale, is of comparatively modern date, the poteen having been manufactured in illicit stills, in inaccessible and unhandy places. Now, Roe’s distillery turns out over two million gallons a year, and Jameson’s more than a million and a half. The whiskey made by these firms, that of Sir John Power & Sons, and some others, is distilled from pure malt; but there are many distilleries that send out a spirit made from molasses, beet-root, potatoes, and other things, which cannot possibly be called whiskey, which has brought Irish whiskey somewhat into disrepute, to the great advantage of the Scotch distillers. Again, unmalted grain is used, which gives a practically tasteless spirit, which is almost entirely deficient in the grateful ethers, and is only so much raw alcohol and water, a very different article to that which occasioned the following verses:—

“Oh, Whiskey Punch, I love you much, for you’re the very thing,

To level all distinctions ’twixt a beggar and a king.

You lift me up so aisy, and so softly let me down,

That the devil a hair I care what I wear, a caubeen or a crown.

“While you’re a-coorsin’ through my veins I feel mighty pleasant,

That I cannot just exactly tell whether I’m a prince or peasant;

Maybe I’m one, maybe the other, but that gives me small trouble,

By the Powers! I believe I’m both on ’em, for I think I’m seein’ double.”

Scotch whiskey is the same as Irish, and should be similarly made from pure malted barley. No one knows when it was first made; but, until the time of the Pretender, it was hardly known in the Lowlands, being a drink strictly of the Highlanders. There is a tradition of a certain St. Thorwald, whose name may be sought for in vain in the pages of Alban Butler, who had a cell in the side of a hill looking upon the Esk. He is said to have possessed a wonderful elixir, famous for curing all diseases, and, consequently, he was resorted to by pilgrims both far and near. Could it be that he had a whiskey still? We know not; but to this day a spring on the site of his hermitage helps to supply the Langholm distillery.

Perhaps the earliest historical account of Scotch whiskey is the grant, in 1690, to Duncan Forbes of Culloden, in consideration of his services to William III., of the privilege of distilling whiskey, duty free, in the barony of Ferrintosh. Naturally, a number of distilleries were erected there, and Ferrintosh became the generic term for whiskey. In 1785 this grant was annulled on payment of £20,000 to the representatives of Duncan Forbes, a proceeding which Robert Burns thus wrote about, in his “Scotch Drink”:—

“Thee, Ferrintosh! O sadly lost!

Scotland laments from coast to coast!

Now colic-grips an’ barkin’ hoast

May kill us a’;

For loyal Forbes’ chartered boast

Is ta’en awa’.”

The Highland risings made the Lowlanders more familiar with this spirit; but it was a long time before the drink became general, and a far longer before it was generally introduced into England. “Bonnie Prince Charlie” got too fond of it, and his affection for strong drinks was life-long. George IV., on his visit to Scotland, thought the best way to popularise himself on his arrival was to call for, and drink, a glass of whiskey; and even our good Queen has tasted “Athol-brose.”

The manufacture of whiskey was encouraged for several reasons: first, that it gave employment; secondly, that it used up large quantities of grain, to the benefit of the farmer; and thirdly, it was hoped that it would, in many cases, supersede the French brandy, which was most extensively smuggled. But Government imposed so high a duty, that illicit stills sprang up everywhere, and contraband whiskey was universally drank, the smugglers openly bringing their wares down south, and in such force as to defy the Excise, and frequently the military. A wise step was then taken, and in 1823 the excise duty was lowered from 6s. 2d. to 2s. 4¾d. per imperial gallon, a proceeding which, in a year, doubled the output of exciseable spirits; but, by degrees, fiscal exigencies have raised it to 10s. per proof gallon. Now, the quantity of home-made spirits on which duty was paid for the year ending 31st March, 1890, is as follows:—

England. Scotland. Ireland.
Galls. Galls. Galls.
12,636,060 9,463,012 7,521,998

or in all, 29,621,070 gallons, yielding a revenue of £14,810,522.

It would be invidious to particularize any of the large Scotch distilleries, which mostly owe their fame to the excellence of their malt and the extreme purity of their water, together with the fact that peat is extensively used as fuel, even to the drying of the malt; but “Glenlivet” has a name as world-wide as “Ferrintosh.” Do we not read in the Bon Gaultier Ballads that—

“Fhairhson had a son

Who married Noah’s daughter,

And nearly spoiled ta flood,

By trinking up ta water;

Which he would have done,

I at least pelieve it,

Had ta mixture peen

Only half Glenlivet”?

It was such a famous place that, according to the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland, there were as many as 200 illicit stills there, in brisk work, at the beginning of the present century.

“Small still” whiskey is undoubtedly the best, for only good materials can be used, as the distillation carries over the flavour of the malt. Hear what Dr. Thudicum says[68]:—

“The product of the patent still derives its name from the fact that it is mere alcohol and water, having no distinctive qualities, telling no tales to nose or palate of the source from which it was obtained, and hence, in the almost poetic spirit of the trade, it is commonly called ‘silent spirit.’ The owner of a patent still, instead of being confined, like a whiskey distiller, to the use of the best materials, is able to make his spirit from any, even spoiled and waste, materials, and with little reference to any other quality than cheapness. The worst of the spirit thus produced is fit only for methylation, preparatory for being used for trade purposes, exclusive of consumption as a beverage. When intended for a beverage, it must be rectified and flavoured. It thus serves as a basis for the implanting of artificial flavours, which may be those of sham whiskey, sham brandy, or sham rum....

“The presence of grain ethers is the condition of the genuineness of whiskey. Silent spirit, on the other hand, undergoes no change by keeping, and must be flavoured to become drinkable. For that purpose it is either made smoky, to become like Scotch, or it is mixed with Irish pot whiskey, to become like Irish whiskey.”

There is yet another and a newer way of altering whiskey, which was shown in the Brewers’ Exhibition at Islington, October, 1890, and described in an advertisement in a morning paper as “A Transformation Scene; no Pantomime.” This new process of maturing spirits is by subjecting them to the action of compressed air confined in a close chamber. Nothing but atmospheric air is used, which is filtered through pure water before being compressed. The air chamber shown was a cylindrical vessel, which, in practice, would be some twelve feet high or more. It is supplied with a finely perforated floor, at a convenient distance below the top, and it has, besides, one or two lower floors of metallic gauze. The cylinder is charged with the liquor to be treated, and the compressed air is then let into it. The taps having been closed on the completion of this operation, a rotary pump keeps the liquor in continuous circulation as it passes through the floors in the form of a fine shower. As soon as it reaches the gauze floor it breaks up into spray, and, in this minute state of sub-division, it is acted on by the condensed air. This air, rising through a pipe, collects at the top of the cylinder, and in that way it is prevented from interfering with the steady flow of the shower. A slight circulation of the air is at the same time promoted. On the process being completed, the liquor is run into casks, and the air which remains in the vessel is allowed to escape, the quantity of alcohol in combination with it not being worth saving.

The object of this process is to bring about the oxidation of the essential oils contained in the whiskey or other spirit, and to promote their conversion into ethers. It is claimed that this transformation does take place, and that the spirit is changed from a new spirit, and has all the character, mellowness, and flavour of that matured by time. This change is said to be effected in twenty-four hours, and that the spirit has, in that period, put on a maturity of ten years.

J. A.

WOODEN CUAGH OR QUAIGH. (Brit. Mus.)

RUM.

Derivation of Name—Whence Procured—Its Manufacture—Its Price—Trade Rum.

The etymon of the name of this spirit is somewhat dubious. Some have it that it was formerly spelt (as it now is in French) Rhum, and that it is derived from rheum, or ῥεῦμα, a flowing, on account of its manufacture from the juice of the sugar cane. Others say that, as rum has the strongest odour of any distilled spirit, it is a corruption of the word aroma.

Rum is made from the refuse of sugar, and can, of course, be produced wherever sugar is grown. This is notably the case in the West Indies, and the best rum comes thence. The finest, and that commanding the highest price in the market, is from Jamaica; Martinique and Guadaloupe perhaps come next; and Santa Cruz has a very good name. British Guiana, the Brazils, Natal, Queensland, and New South Wales all produce it.

It is made from molasses and the skimmings of the boiling sugar. Molasses is the syrup remaining after the separation of all the saccharine matter which will crystallize, and is a dense, viscous liquid, varying from light yellow to nearly black, according to the source from which it is obtained; but its distillation will not produce rum. Sugar or molasses, if distilled, will produce alcohol, but it will have no character of rum. This peculiar odour is imparted to it by the addition, in distillation, of “skimmings,” which are the matters separated from the sugar in clarifying and evaporation; that is to say, the scum of the precipitators, clarifiers and evaporators is mixed with the rinsing of the boiling pans, and is thus called. They contain all the necessaries of fermentation, and when mixed with molasses and “dunder,” which is the fermented wash left from distillation, are distilled into rum.

The odour of rum is very volatile; so much so, that it should be casked immediately after distillation. The raw spirit is extremely injurious; but it improves so much by age that, at a sale in Carlisle in 1865, rum, known to be 140 years old, sold at three guineas a bottle. Like all alcohol, rum, when distilled, is white, the colour being given to it, as it used to be in brown brandy, by caramel (burnt sugar). Much of the rum sold in England is made from “silent” spirit, flavoured with butyric ether; and it is this stuff which is sold as “trade rum” for export to Africa. Some years since an action was brought by an African merchant against the vendor of “trade rum” for damages caused by it to his trade. All went merrily till the negroes drank the rum, when it suddenly ceased, owing to its colouring their excreta red, probably owing to the colouring matter.

In the old days of punch drinking, rum was the great ingredient in that beverage, but its use has gradually died out, except among sailors, it still being served out in the navy, on account of its supposed warming qualities. Rum and milk, taken before breakfast, is also a beverage used very extensively.

J. A.

LIQUEURS.
I.

Derivation of Term—Eichhoff—Gregory of Tours—Liqueur Wines—Herb Wines—Scot’s Ivanhoe—Hydromel—Murrey—Delille—Montaigne—Monastical Liqueurs—Arnold de Villeneuve—Catherine de Medicis—Elixir Ratafia.

The word liqueur has been traced by Eichhoff to a Sanskrit root, viz., laks or lauc, to see, appear. It is now commonly understood of a drink obtained by distillation, a beverage of which alcohol is the base.

To the ancients liqueurs appear to have been unknown. The art of distillation on which they depend was not apparently discovered till the middle ages. Fermented wines, of which some description will be found in another part of this book, occupied their place at dinner and dessert. Old Falernian when mixed with honey probably bore some near resemblance to what is now understood by liqueur. But this drink was found to have such disastrous effects by way of intoxication that it was forbidden to women to drink of it.

Our ancestors, perhaps in imitation of the ancients, composed a sort of liqueur with the must of wine, in which they had infused berries of the lentiscus, or a portion of its tender wood. The artificial wines made either with this lentiscus, or with other aromatic herbs, called by Gregory of Tours vina odoramentis immixta, were the only approaches to the modern liqueurs, even some time after the discovery of the process of distillation.

Among these liqueur wines must be mentioned that species of cooked wine which was the result of a portion of must reduced to half or a third of its original bulk by boiling. The capitularies of Charlemagne speak of this drink as vinum coctum, and the southern provinces called it Sabe, from the Latin sapa, which with the Romans had the same signification. Both Galen and Hippocrates refer to a Greek composition called Siræum or Hepsema, which, says Pliny, we call sapa. The fashion in which this wine was cooked is shown in the Pitture antiche d’Ercolano, t. I., tab. 35.

Those artificial wines which consisted solely of infusions of aromatic or medicinal plants, such as absinthe, aloes, anise, rosemary, hyssop, and so on, were called herb wines, and were frequently employed as remedies and preventives. With a herb wine, the wine of a honied absinthe, it was that Fredegonda poisoned him who reproached her with the murder of the Pretextate. The most famous of these wines were those into which entered, besides honey, the spices and aromatic confections of Asia, to which were given the name of pigments. The highly spiced and “most odoriferous” wine sweetened with honey is one of those drinks which Cedric bids Oswald, in Ivanhoe,[69] to place upon the board for the refreshment of the Knight Templar. It is mentioned in company with the oldest wine, the best mead, the mightiest ale, the richest morat,[70] and the most sparkling cider.

The poets of the thirteenth century speak of this decoction with transport. They regarded it in the light of an exquisite delicacy. As no gentleman’s library is complete without the presence of some particular work of which a bookseller is anxious to dispose, so no feast at which pigment was not present was held to be complete by the medieval gourmet. Indeed this drink seems to have been all too sweet, and was, in consequence of its inebriating property, like the honied Falernian, partially prohibited. The Council of Aix-la-Chapelle in 817 decreed that on festival days only might this voluptuous cup be introduced into conventual repasts.

Hydromel and hippocras were allied to this category of fermented and almost alcoholic drinks, but they were not liqueurs. Finally certain liqueurs were composed entirely of juices of fruits and held the rank and title of wines. Such were cherry, gooseberry, strawberry wine, and others. Another liqueur wine often cited by the thirteenth-century poets is Murrey, a thin drink coloured or otherwise affected by mulberries.

The word liqueur appears to have had a considerable latitude of signification. We talk now of coffee and liqueur, but according to the French poet Delille, who lived at a time very near our own, coffee itself was included under the latter category—

“Cest toi, divin café, dont l’aimable liqueur

Sans altérer la tête épanouit le cœur”:

which presents us with a view of coffee akin to that held by Cowper of tea, when he talks in his Task (Book IV.) of

“the cups

That cheer but not inebriate.”

Liqueurs, indeed, properly so called were not known till long after the distillation of wine had been recognised, probably about the fourteenth century. Many years elapsed before these preparations escaped from the domination of the alchemists. Those religious who employed distillation for the confection of balsams and panaceas seem to have been the first to discover them to the world. Montaigne, in the strange account he has written of his travel in Italy, speaks of the Jesuits of Vicenza—the Jesuates as he calls them—who had a liquor shop in their fair monastery, in which were sold phials of scent for a crown. The good fathers appear to have busied themselves in the intervals of their religious exercises with distilling waters of different herbs and flowers for the public use, as well for medicine as for sensual delight. Speaking of Verona, Montaigne says he saw also a religious of monks who call themselves Jesuates of St. Jérosme. They are dressed in white under a smoked robe with little white caps. They are not priests, neither do they say mass, nor preach,[71] and they are for the most part ignorant. But they make a boast to be excellent distillers of eau de naffé[72] and other waters, both in Verona and elsewhere.

Monastical liqueurs are worthy of a paragraph to themselves. So long as monks have existed, they seem to have manifested a taste for the concoction of these drinks. We can scarcely pass the shop window of a liqueur-seller without having our attention attracted by what the French call a Kyrielle or litany of flasks of diverse forms, decorated with tickets bearing such titles as the following:—Liqueur des Chartreux, Liqueur des Benedictins, Liqueur des Carmes, Liqueur des Trappistes, Liqueur des Pères de Garaison, Liqueur du P. Kermann, and so on. A large volume might well be composed on these liqueurs alone. About their supposed virtues,—aperient, digestive, antiapoplectic, antispasmodic, anticholeric, tonic, etc., that book might be well supposed likely to stretch out as far as the list of Banquo’s issue to the diseased imagination of Macbeth.

The search for the philosopher’s stone and the powder of projection was by no means wholly fruitless. It strengthened the hands of chemistry. It was also the cradle of liqueurs. In the early part of the middle ages the learned inhabitants of the convents devoted their leisure time, of which they appear to have had no lack, to the so-called magnum opus. The magnum opus, the quintessence, the elixir of long life, were three different denominations of one and the same thing. Monkish intellectual toil was chiefly connected at that time with the study of essences, spirits, alcohols, and distillations. The plants which they sought with the greatest eagerness were rosemary, arnica, elder, camomile, sweet trefoil, rose, borage, balm mint, snake weed, iris, etc.

In the thirteenth century, Arnold de Villeneuve, a celebrated physician, possessed with this devil of a magnum opus, formulated the question of the quintessence or elixir of long life in these terms, which became afterwards a dogma for all his monastic successors. “This is the secret, viz., to find substances so homogeneous to our nature that they can increase it without inflaming it, continue it without diminishing it ... as our life continually loses somewhat, until at last all is lost.” The outcome of the long and patient labours of the monkish alchemists was certain elixirs and liqueurs, of which the secret composition was transmitted from generation to generation in convents and monasteries. Such liqueurs were in their origin simply a pharmaceutic product. It is only within the last few years comparatively that they have been converted into delicacies after dinner. Our age bears the hall mark of positivism. The monks labour no longer for the sole glory of God and comfort of the sick. Their object at the present day is to effect, it is affirmed, a ready and productive sale. It may be so; happily it is not our business to determine. It is certain that a vast development has taken place in the manufacture of the majority of the monkish liqueurs. The Chartreux of L’Isère now realize annual benefices of considerable value, of which a portion is said to be contributed to the continually diminishing Papal exchequer, under the title of Peter’s pence. Of this medicinal liqueur the active and benevolent element is gathered from herbs scattered on the Alpine mountains cold, or on the slopes of the Pyrenees, or in the sombre forests of the north (see the Prospectus), or in the shops of the apothecaries. But they all assuredly depend upon cognac for their element of life. Benedictine, with its four cabalistic letters, A M D G,[73] is made by the monks of Fécamp, at the famous Carthusian monastery of La Grande Chartreuse, near Grenoble. The elixir of long life, de Sept-Fonds, is made in a convent of the Trappists of l’Allier, and Trappistine is the work of the good fathers of the abbey of La Grâce-Dieu (Doubs). It is, however, affirmed that only Chartreuse, coloured yellow or green at will, and Trappistine, are the works of religious hands, while all other liqueurs are made by the laics. The methods of fabrication employed in the convents are now well known.[74] Benedictine is the only liqueur which has escaped analysis.

Absinthe is not strictly a liqueur. It substitutes bitter for sweet. This strong spirituous liquor, so prejudicial to French health and morality, is, however, commonly called a liqueur. Its base is an alcoholate, composed of anise, coriander, and fennel. It is flavoured with wormwood, a species of artemisia, and other plants containing absinthin. It is said to be commonly coloured with indigo and sulphate of copper. It is prepared chiefly in Switzerland, but much of it is made at Bordeaux.

Arnold de Villeneuve, in his medical treatise, written in Latin, On the preservation of youth and the retardation of age, has a sermon upon Golden water. “I have not,” he says, “read the properties of this water in books of distinguished authority, but it is to be presumed that, if it exists, it is so sublime a work that they have concealed the method of its preparation, and have even refused to mention its name. Of gold, however, they have spoken, and set it among cordial medicines. They have praised it for the comforting of the heart and for the palliation of leprosy. It is possible that since we every day find things diversified by alteration of substance, acquiring the operations of those other things into which they have been transformed, so out of wine may be made a water of life very different from wine both in colour and in substance, in effect and in operation. And the doubt here is, not about the fact, but how it is brought about. That the bodies of all metals may be reduced into water by the ingenuity of mankind, experience allows us not to question; but the operation and nature of those things by which this end is obtained it is no easy matter to discover.”

This golden water was originally nothing else than eau de vie in which had been macerated certain herbs and aromatic spices to give it taste and colour; afterwards minute portions of metallic gold were added. The ingredients mentioned by Arnold de Villeneuve are rosemary flowers, from which, he says, the water obtains its golden colour, cinnamon, grains of paradise, cloves, cubebs, liquorice, and the like.

In the mind of the middle ages, gold was held to be a remedy for every ill. Many people applied themselves to the task of dissolving this metal and rendering it potable. It was put into drinks, baths, victuals, pills, and the pharmacopeia of the time abounds in elixirs of gold, tinctures of gold, drops of gold, and so on. To please the public eye, those pieces of the precious metal were cast into the composition which we now know as Eau de vie de Dantzig.

Catherine de Medicis brought into France all the voluptuous discoveries and superfluities of Italy, and helped to augment considerably the number of new liqueurs and to popularize their usage. Henry II. was especially fond of the anisette of Marie Brizard of Bordeaux. Sully, in 1604, examining the objects of luxury in France, found Populo and Rossolio to have the chief share in the public estimation and expenditure. Of them Populo is mentioned in the Letters of Gui-Patin.[75] It was composed of spirits of wine, water, sugar, musk, amber, essence of anise, and essence of cinnamon.

Rossolis, our Rossolio, or Rossoli, said to be derived, in consequence of its extreme excellence, from the dew of the sun, ros solis, was made of burnt brandy, sugar, and the juice of sweet fruits, such as cherries or mulberries. Louis XIV. was much attached to this particular liqueur. That prepared for him was said to differ a little from the ordinary compound. A receipt is given of the king’s drink.

Equal quantities of eau de vie and Spanish wine, in which were infused anise, coriander, fennel, citron, angelica, and sugar-candy dissolved in camomile water, and boiled to a thick syrup, were a distinctive feature in this royal liqueur.

Owing to oblivion or ignorance of the anisette of Henri II. this monarchical recognition of rossolio has led to the supposition that liqueurs were invented to invigorate the senile decrepitude of Louis XIV., but it has been shown that they existed long before his time. George IV. is said to have been attached to liqueurs in much the same way as Louis XIV., who may have supposed that they in some measure improved his health or arrested his decay.

The liqueur industry is chiefly continental, and the liqueurs are very numerous. Holland is famous for its Curaçoa and Russia for its Kümmel, and almost every large district of France has its own speciality of liqueur. Bordeaux[76] is remarkable for its Anisette, Dijon for its Cassis, Marseilles for its Absinthe, Grenoble for its Ratafias, and Paris and Lyons are each noted for many different kinds.

The English have attained as yet no high rank as liqueur manufacturers. The prosaic nature of the Trade Returns includes all liqueurs of foreign origin under the heading of “Sweetened or mixed Spirits.” It makes no distinction between Eaux and Crèmes or between Ratafias and Elixirs. We have been told that elixirs are yellow and aromatized, and eaux or crèmes white, while ratafias are substantially infusions of fruit. Originally this may have been so. It is not the case at present.

Both Elixir and Ratafia are interesting from an etymological standpoint. The latter word has excited considerable discussion. Menage, writing it as it was commonly written in his time, ratafiat, says it is a term derived from the East Indies. Leibnitz, on the contrary, holds it to be a corruption of rectifié applied to alcohol. Another etymology is rata fiat. Parties were supposed to enter into a contract, and after drinking the liqueur to say, “Let it be ratified.”

Elixir[77] is an Arabic word derived from the Greek, by which the alchemists denoted their powder of projection or philosopher’s stone.

LIQUEURS.
II.

Liqueur Maker’s Guide. German Liqueurs: Eau d’Amour—Eau Divine. Dantzig Liqueurs: Eau Miraculeuse—Eau Aerienne. French Liqueurs: Vespetro—Scubac—Absinthe—Maraschino, etc. Du Verger—Vermuth, etc.

To a humble and unpretending volume, little known by the world, to the Cordial and Liqueur Makers’ Guide, and Publicans’ Instructor, we are indebted for a large part of the information in the present chapter. This excellent and possibly unique volume of modern date contains some two hundred receipts for the manufacture of the most favourite drinks in their greatest perfection; in addition to a variety of miscellaneous matter of much practical utility to the publicans’ profession, though of no immediate interest probably to the readers of the present book. For instance, we are taught therein the mysteries of Spirit Beading, or, in exoteric language, the putting a head on weak spirits, and the fining of sherry, port, gin, ale, and porter. Most of the receipts, we are assured, have never before appeared in print. They are the result of an experience of some thirty years. A warning is given in the preface about the common and extensive adulteration of liqueurs with essential oils, turpentine, and spirits of wine.

In the first chapter of the Cordial and Liqueur Makers’ Guide, we find receipts for those familiar beverages which are most common in our respectable public firms—public house is what Bentham would call an emotional term—such as Peppermint, Cloves, Rum Shrub, Aniseed, Caraway, Noyeau, Raspberry, Gingerette, Orange Bitters, Wormwood Bitters, Lemonade, Capillaire, Cherry Brandy, Cinnamon, Lovage, and Usquebaugh—of these the receipt for Lovage may be taken as a sole representative.

This aromatic drink, which is comparatively rare, is perhaps not generally known to be prepared from a plant indigenous to Liguria, a country of Cisalpine Gaul—from which country its name is through sundry philological decadences derived.[78] After reading this, the student of human nature and mercantile morality will be fully prepared to learn that the plant indigenous to Liguria enters in no way into its composition.

Mix, says the receipt, five drams of oil of nutmegs, five drams of oil of cassia, and three drams of oil of caraway in a quart of strong spirits of wine. Shake it well, and put it into a ten gallon cask with two gallons more of spirits of wine. Dissolve twenty pounds of lump sugar in hot water, add this to the spirit with a quarter of a pint of colouring, and fill up the cask with water. Fine it down with two ounces of alum dissolved in boiling water, and put into the goods[79] hot; afterwards add one ounce of salts of tartar, and stir the whole well together.

The receipts which follow of German, Dantzig, and French liqueurs postulate a preliminary grinding of all dry substances, such as cloves or cinnamon; the cutting into the smallest pieces of leaves, flowers, peels; and the reducing to a paste, by means of a marble mortar, of almonds and fruit kernels with a small quantity of spirits to prevent them oiling.[79] These ingredients should be allowed to soak in the spirit for a month with diurnal shakings in a warm place. Then the spirit must be poured off and the water added after the quantity in the receipt. After standing a few days, pour off, press out all the liquid, mix with the spirit, add sugar and colouring matter, and filter through a flannel bag. In the matter of gold and silver leaf, an attempt to break it when dry would reduce one half to dust, and so spoil the appearance of the liqueur. It must be spread on a plate which has a little thin syrup on it. The leaf must also be covered with the syrup, and then torn by means of two forks into small pieces about the size of a canary seed. The leaf should not be added until the liqueur is in the bottle. The reader will observe the common use of capillaire.[80]

German Liqueurs.

Eau de Sultane Zoraide.

Lemon peel, 8 ounces; orange peel, 8 ounces; figs, 8 ounces; dates, 4 ounces; jessamine flowers, 4 ounces; cinnamon, 3 ounces; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; orange-flower water, 2 quarts; pure water, 12 quarts; capillaire, 8 quarts. Colour,[81] rose.

Eau Nuptiale.

Parsley seed, 6 ounces; carrot seed, 5 ounces; aniseed, orris root, 2 ounces each; mace, 1½ ounces; spirit, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; rose water, 7 pints; water, 11 quarts; capillaire, 9 quarts. Colour, yellow.

Eau d’ Amour.

Bitter almonds, lemon peel, 12 ounces each; cinnamon, 6 ounces; mace, 1 ounce; cloves, 1½ ounces; lavender flowers, 8 ounces; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; Muscat wine, 8 quarts; oil of amber, 36 drops; water 7 quarts; capillaire, 7 quarts. Colour, rose.

Eau de Yalpa.

Marjoram, cinnamon, 3 ounces each; fennel seed, thyme, sweet basil, bitter almonds, figs, balm, 2 ounces each; carrot seed, sage, 1 ounce each; cardamom, cloves, ½ ounce each; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; essence of vanilla, 50 drops; essence of amber, 50 drams; water, 14 quarts; capillaire 8 quarts. Colour, scarlet.

Eau Divine.

Lemon peel, 1½ pounds; coriander, 4 ounces; mace, cardamom, 1 ounce each; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; oil of bergamot, 1½ drams; oil of Neroly,[82] 2 drams; water, 14 quarts; capillaire, 8 quarts.

Eau de Pucelle.

Juniper berries, 1½ pounds; fennel seed, 4 ounces; angelica seed, cinnamon, 3 ounces each; cloves, 1 ounce; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; water, 13 quarts; capillaire, 10 quarts. Colour, yellow.

Other German liqueurs, according to our authority, are Eau de Zelia, de Rebecca, de Fantaisie, the ruby Eau des Epicuriens, the Elixir Monfron, the Eau Divine, the Eau d’Orient de Napoleon, de Didon, du Dauphin, de Santé, Royale, Américaine, de Paix, de J. Saint-Aure, de Mille-Fleurs, d’Argent, de Montpellier, d’Ardelle, de Turin, de Tubinge, du Sorcier-Comte, de Vertu, de Chypre, de Jacques, Romantique, Crème Voizot, Aqua Bianca, and many others.

Dantzig Liqueurs.

Eau Miraculeuse.

Orange peel, lemon peel, 1 pound each; cinnamon, ginger, 6 ounces each; rosemary leaves, 2 ounces; galanga,[83] mace, cloves, 1 ounce each; orris root, 1½ ounces; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; capillaire, 8 quarts; water, 14 quarts. Colour, red.

Eau Aerienne.[84]

Figs, 12 ounces; cumin, 5 ounces; leaves of rosemary, fennel seed, 4 ounces each; cinnamon, 5 ounces; sage, sassafras, 2 ounces each; lavender flowers, camomile flowers, orris root, 4 ounces each; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 19 quarts; capillaire, 8 quarts; water, 14 quarts.

Other Dantzig liqueurs mentioned are the Eau de vie de Dantzig, Eau Forcifère, Christophelet, Eau Carminative, de Musettier, de Girofle, Persicot, Amer d’Angleterre, and Eau des Favorites, the ruby gold sprinkled Eau de Lisette, the yellow Krambambuli,[85] the Eau de Baal, and the Liqueur des Évèques.

French Liqueurs.

Vespetro.[86]

Angelica seed, 3 ounces; coriander seed, 2 ounces; fennel seed, aniseed, ½ ounce each; lemons sliced, oranges sliced, 6 ounces each; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 12 quarts; water, 9½ pints; capillaire, 3 pints.

Eau de Scubac.[87]

Lemon peel, 6 ounces; coriander, 4 ounces; aniseed, juniper berries, cinnamon, 2 ounces each; angelica root, 1½ ounces; saffron, 1 ounce; spirits of wine, 60 o.p., 10 quarts; orange-flower water, 2 quarts; capillaire, 4 quarts; water, 8 quarts.

Elixir de Garus.[88]

Myrrh, aloes, 2 drams each; cloves, nutmegs, 3 drams each; saffron, 1 ounce; cinnamon, 5 drams; spirits of wine, p., 5 quarts; sugar, 6 pounds.

Amiable[89] Vainqueur.

Spirits of wine, p., 25 quarts; essential oil of citron, 1 ounce; of neroli, of angelica, ½ ounce each; tincture of vanilla, 1 dram; sugar 12 pounds; water, 4 quarts.

Guignolet[90] d’Angers.

Spirits of wine, p., 12 quarts; cherries with the stones, raspberries, gooseberries, red currants, 1 pound each; oil of cinnamon, of cloves, 10 drops each; sugar, 7 pounds; water, 2 quarts.

Huile des Jeunes Mariés.

Aniseed, fennel seed, 2 ounces each; angelica seed, cumin seed, caraway seed, 1 ounce each; coriander, 3 ounces; spirits of wine, p., 4 quarts; distilled water, 3 quarts; sugar, 10 pounds. Colour, yellow.

Other French liqueurs worthy of notice are Eau Archiepiscopale, des Financiers, de Noyeau, de Phalsbourg, de Jasmin, des chevaliers de Saint Louis, des Pacificateurs de la Grèce, Souvenir d’un Brave, Goûte Nationale, Coquette Flatteuse, Ratafias of different kinds, such as Absinthe, Angelique, Celery, Quatre Graines,[91] Cerises, Noyeau and Carve,[92] Amour sans Fin, Gaîté Française, Plaisir des Dames, Citronelle, Elixir Columbat, Eau des Chevaliers de la Legion d’Honneur, Eau des Amis, Crème de Macaron, and Eau de Pologne, the crimson Alkermes, the emerald Huile des Venus, the Elixir des Anges, the pale straw-coloured Eau de vie d’Andaye,[93] the crimson Nectar des Dieux, and Missilimakinac.

The most important, or rather the most popular in this country, of the very numerous alcoholic preparations which are flavoured, or perfumed, or sweetened, or more commonly treated in all these three ways to be agreeable to the taste are, placing them as they suggest themselves:—

Kümmel, or Kimmel, as it is sometimes incorrectly written, from the German name of the herb cumin, is made with sweetened spirit, generally brandy, flavoured with coriander and caraway seeds. It is chiefly produced at Riga, and is much esteemed in Java and the Eastern Archipelago generally.

Maraschino is distilled from bruised cherries. The fruit and seed are crushed together. It is commonly prepared in Italy and Dalmatia from a delicately flavoured variety called Marazques or Marascas, a small, black, wild cherry, so named, it is said, from its bitterness. Zara, in Dalmatia, is the principal place of production of Maraschino.

Cassis[94] (or Cacis) is a sort of ratafia made with the fruit of the cassis, the vulgar French name of a species of gooseberry with black berries.

Noyau, or Crème de Noyau, derived from the French word for a kernel, is commonly prepared from white brandy, bitter almonds or amygdalin, sugar candy, mace, and nutmeg. Its distinctive flavour comes from the amygdalin, or the kernels of peaches, plums, cherries, apricots, and other fruit. In Dominica the bark of the noyau tree (Cerasus occidentalis) is used, and in France the leaves of a small convolvulus-like tropical plant called Ipomœa dissectis. It is coloured white and pink.

Ratafias are called by du Verger liqueurs de conversation, and eau clairettes and hypoteques, an old term of which Menage expresses himself unable to find the derivation as applied to a liqueur. The Master Distiller considers them preferable to spirituous liqueurs. Procope, the ancient Master of Paris, includes under this term liqueurs, or syrups, as we should say, of cherries, strawberries, gooseberries, apricots, peaches, and other fruits. He it was who first proposed the pressure of the fruits, without infusing them entire. Some years afterwards, Breard, one of the chiefs of the fruitery of Louis XIV., gave these liqueurs the name of Hypoteques to distinguish them. The products both of Procope and Breard were of the highest excellence. “‘I,’ says du Verger, ‘have always considered Procope’s Ratafias as finer and more delicate, those of Breard softer and more flowing; but,’ he adds, ‘as tastes differ, both their Ratafias have their approvers and their critics. It is difficult to equal them in cold countries, either in taste or in smell.’” They are called Liqueurs of conversation, because, according to this authority, in talking after meals, you may drink of them three or four times as much as of other liqueurs without fear of any inconvenience. Nay, they nourish and fortify the stomach, and in addition to being pleasant to the palate, are good friends of the liver.

The first Ratafia was called Eau de Cerises, or cherry water. The kernels should be added to the juice of the fruit with cinnamon and mace in small quantities. This renders the composition beneficent, strengthens the brain, and banishes the vapours.

The Eau clairette de framboises is also composed of cherries, though a few strawberries are added to give the dominant flavour. It should, therefore, says the Master Distiller, be rather called Eau clairette framboisée.

L’eau clairette de groseilles has a specific virtue against biliousness.

L’eau clairette de grenade is the most agreeable of Ratafias, but has an astringent property.

L’eau clairette de coings is still more estimable than the preceding, and imparts a new activity to the limbs.

Eau clairette de Chamberri should be made of the ripest black grapes, a small quantity of spirit of wine, a little sugar, and other ingredients. In addition to giving an appetite, it rejoices the heart. The longer it is kept, as in the case with all Ratafias, the better.

The white Ratafias, or Hypoteques, should be mixed with cinnamon, mace, cloves, and coriander. Under these circumstances they render the blood balsamic. The best fruits for white Ratafias are oranges, peaches, and apricots.

Curaçoa derives its name from the group of small islands in the West Indies, situated near the north shore of Venezuela, in the Caribbean Sea. The liqueur is made in these islands by the Dutch. It is also made at Amsterdam from orange peel imported from the Curaçoas. The bitter orange used is the Citrus bigaradia.

It is commonly obtained by digesting orange peel in sweetened spirits, and flavouring with cinnamon, cloves, or mace. The spirits employed are usually reduced to nearly 56 under proof, and each gallon contains about 3½ pounds of sugar. Curaçoa varies in colour. The darker is produced by powdered Brazil wood, mellowed by caramel.

Parfait Amour is a liqueur composed of several ingredients, such as citron, clove, muscat, and others.

Kirsch, Kirschwasser, or Kirschenwasser, or cherry water, is the genuine drink of the Black Forest. The head-quarters of this liqueur, as Griesbach and Petersthal in the Reuch valley, are rich in cherry trees of the Machaleb variety. H. W. Wolff, in his Rambles, rises into an almost poetic description of its virtues. “It is,” he says, referring to the Black Foresters, “their general stimulant and comforter, their consoler in grief, their promoter of conviviality, their safety valve in trouble or excitement.” After this, little can be added without the danger, or rather the certainty, of bathos. When genuine—for alas, it shares the common fate of drinks, adulteration—it is said to be ardent and slightly poisonous. In other words, it contains “that excellent stomachic, hydrocyanic acid.” Of late the Black Foresters have rivalled the Servians in a spirit distilled from wild plums. Stolberg thinks Kirschenwasser in no way inferior to the spirit made from corn at Dantzic,[95] and others hold it equal to the Dalmatian Maraschino. The liqueur is also made in Germany, France, and elsewhere.

Pomeranzen, or Pomeranzen-Wasser, somewhat resembling our orangeade, is principally drunk in Northern Germany.

Raspail was originally, as many other liqueurs, medicinal, and was so called from the name of its inventor. Mariani has made an Elixir à la coca du Pérou. This, like Raspail, is an agreeable tonic.

Vermuth[96] is composed of white wine, angelica, absinthe, and other aromatic herbs.

Many sweet wines approach very nearly liqueurs. Of these are in Austria some sweet wines of Transylvania and Dalmatia. In Spain, the Tinto d’Alicante, and the white Muscats of Malaga. In France, Hermitage, Grenache, Colmar, and the Muscats of Rivesaltes and of Roquevaire. In Cyprus, La Commanderie. In Italy, the Muscats of Vesuvius, Orvieto and Montefiascone, the holy wine of Castiglione, the white wines of Albano, and the aromatic wine of Chiavenna. In Greece, the Malmseys of Santorin and the Ionian Isles. In Russia, the wines of Koos and Sudach in the Crimea; and in Mexico, those of Passo del Nocte, Paras, San Luiz de la Paz, and Zelaya.

In the Widdowes Treasure, London, 1595, are receipts for Sirrop of Roses or Violets, and two receipts for Rosa Solis, and in the Good Housewife’s Jewele, London, 1596, are receipts for distilling of Rosemary water, Imperiall water, Sinamon water, and the Water of Life.

AMERICAN DRINKS.

Cobblers—Cocktails—Flips, etc.—Punch—Varieties—A Bar Tender—Anstey’s Pleader’s Guide—A Yard of Flannel—Bottled Velvet—Rumfustian, etc.

The great authority, probably the greatest authority, on this interesting subject is a gentleman who, with the true modesty of genius, allows himself to be known only by the pseudonym of Jerry Thomas. Formerly a bar-tender at the Metropolitan Hotel, New York, and the Planter’s House, St. Louis, he is said to have travelled over Europe and America in “search of all that is recondite in this branch of the spirit art.” His very name, says one of his admirers, is synonymous in the lexicon of mixed drinks with all that is rare and original.

Among the chief American drinks are, being alphabetically arranged, cobblers, cocktails, cups, flips, juleps, mulls, nectars, neguses, noggs, punches—of which there are at least three score—sangarees, shrubs, slings, smashes, and toddies.[97]

The cobbler is an American invention, though now common in other countries. It requires small skill in its composition, but should be arranged to please the eye. Of this drink the straw is the leading characteristic.

The cocktail is a comparatively modern discovery. In this drink Bogart’s Bitters occupies invariably a prominent place. The Crusta is an improvement on the cocktail, and is said to have been invented by Santina, a celebrated Spanish caterer. Its differentia is a small quantity of lemon juice and a little lump of ice. The paring of a lemon must also line the glass, from which feature it probably derives its name.

Flip has been immortalised by Dibdin as the favourite beverage of sailors, though it has been asserted that they seldom drink it; a somewhat hazardous statement, unless limited to the times in which there is none to be had. The essential feature in a flip is repeated pouring between two vessels, supposed to produce smoothness in the drink. The Slang Dictionary holds flip to be synonymous with Flannel, the old term for gin and beer drunk hot with nutmeg, sugar, etc., a play on the old name lamb’s wool. The anecdote of Goldsmith drinking flannel in a night-house with George Parker, Ned Shuter, and the demure, grave-looking gentleman, is well known.

MINT JULEP.

The julep is especially popular in the Southern States, and is said to have been introduced into England by Captain Marryatt. That romance-writing seaman in his work on America, says: “I must descant a little upon the mint julep, as it is, with the thermometer at 100°, one of the most delightful and insinuating potations that ever was invented, and may be drunk with equal satisfaction when the thermometer is as low as 70°. There are many varieties, such as those composed of Claret, Madeira, etc., but the ingredients of the real mint julep are as follows. I learned how to make them, and succeeded pretty well.” Then follows the receipt:—

“Put into a tumbler about a dozen sprigs of the tender shoots of mint, upon them put a spoonful of white sugar, and equal proportions of peach and common brandy so as to fill it up one-third, or perhaps a little less. Then take rasped or pounded ice and fill up the tumbler. Epicures rub the lips of the tumbler with a piece of fresh pine apple, and the tumbler itself is very often incrusted outside with stalactites of ice. As the ice melts, you drink.”

“I once,” says the marine author of this receipt, of which the reader has ipsissima verba, “I once overheard two ladies talking in the next room to me, and one of them said, ‘Well, if I have a weakness for any one thing, it is for a mint julep!’”

This weakness of the American lady was, in the opinion of the Metropolitan Hotel barman in New York, very amiable, and proved, not only her good taste, but her good sense.

In mulls, which may be made of any kind of wine, the essential feature is the boiling. Sugar and spice, of which the nursery song tells us little girls are manufactured, are also invariably used in mulls. We give a rhymed receipt for mulled wine, not for the sake of the poetry, which is indifferent, but for that of the cookery, which is not bad.

“First, my dear madam, you must take

Nine eggs, which carefully you’ll break,

Into a bowl you’ll drop the white,

The yolks into another by it.”

Here the poet was evidently hard pressed for a rhyme.

“Let Betsy beat the whites with switch,

Till they appear quite frothed and rich;

Another hand the yolks must beat

With sugar, which will make them sweet.”

An ordinary effect of sugar. Poet probably hard pressed as before.

“Three or four spoonfuls maybe’ll do,

Though some perhaps would take but two.

Into a skillet next you’ll pour

A bottle of good wine, or more;

Put half a pint of water, too,

Or it may prove too strong for you.”

This is personal, nay more, it might to some good people be offensive, as indicating deficiency of cerebral power or endurance.

“And while the eggs by two are beating,

The wine and water may be heating;

But when it comes to boiling heat,

The yolks and whites together beat

With half a pint of water more,

Mixing them well, then gently pour

Into the skillet with the wine,

And stir it briskly all the time.”

Poet again hard pressed.

“Then pour it off into a pitcher,

Grate nutmeg in to make it richer,

Then drink it hot, for he’s a fool

Who lets such precious liquor cool.”

Of nectar we have no information worth the reader’s acceptance. It appears to be applied indifferently to any dulcet drink.

Negus may be made of any sweet wine, but is commonly composed of Port. “It is,” says Jerry Thomas, “a most refreshing and elegant beverage, particularly for those who do not take punch or grog after supper.”

Egg-nogg, of which other noggs seem to be the lineal descendants, though a beverage of American origin, has “a popularity that is cosmopolitan. In the South of the United States it is almost indispensable at Christmas time, and at the North it is a favourite at all seasons.” In Scotland the beverage is called “auld man’s milk.” The presence of the egg constitutes the differentia in this drink. Every well-ordered bar has a tin egg-nogg “shaker,” which is a great aid in mixing. The historian will be glad to learn that it was General Harrison’s favourite beverage, and the consumptive and debilitated person that it is full of nourishment.

“A CROWN BOWL OF PUNCH.”

Punch[98] is remarkable for its variety. It is considered necessary by the adept to rub the sugar on the rind of the citron or lemon, to extract properly what the experienced drinker calls “the ambrosial essence.” The extraction of the ambrosial essence, and the making the mixture sweet and strong, using tea instead of water, and thoroughly amalgamating all the compounds, so that the taste of neither the bitter, the sweet, the spirit, nor the element shall be perceptible one over the other, is the grand secret of making punch. And to this, as to other learning, there is no royal road. It must, alas! be laboriously acquired by practice. Many are the mysteries of its concoction. For instance, it is essential in making hot punch that you put in the spirits before the water; in cold punch the other way. The precise portions of spirit and water, or even of the acidity and sweetness, can have no general rule. To attempt offering one would only mislead. A certain inspiration must animate the artist. It has been asserted that no two persons make this drink alike. This remark is admirable, and might probably be applied not only to punch, but to every drink that has yet been composed.

It has been said that of punches there are at least threescore. Here follow a few of the many varieties: Brandy, Sherry, Gin, Whiskey, Port, Sauterne, Claret, Missisippi, Vanilla, Pine Apple, Orgeat, Curaçoa, Roman, Glasgow, Milk, and Regent’s, brewed by George IV.; St. Charles’, Louisiana, Sugar House, La Patria, Spread Eagle, Imperial, Rochester, and Rocky Mountain; Non-Such, Philadelphia, Fish-House, Canadian, Tip-Top, Bimbo, Nuremburgh, Ruby, Royal, Century Club, Duke of Norfolk, Uncle Toby, and Gothic.

People have immortalised themselves by the invention of punches to which a grateful country has attached their names. Of these famous ones are General Ford, for many years commanding engineer at Dover; Dr. Shelton Mackenzie, of Glasgow; D’Orsay; and M. Grassot, the eminent French comedian of the Palais Royal, who communicated his receipt to Mr. Howard Paul, the equally eminent entertainer, when performing in Paris.

Last, though not least, the military have thus distinguished themselves by the National Guard, the 7th Regiment Punch, the 69th Regiment Punch, the 32nd Regiment or Victoria Punch, and the Light Guard Punch.

The sangaree, originally a West Indian drink, is as unsatisfactory in its explanation as in its etymology. It seems, indeed, to be little more than spirit and water, with sugar and nutmeg to taste. It very nearly approaches, if it is not identical with, toddy.[99]

Shrubs[100] are unsatisfactory, like sangarees. They seem to have no distinctive or differentiating feature. The most common kinds are Rum, Brandy, Cherry, and Currant.

Slings are very closely related to toddies. Their difference is, indeed, infinitesimal, so far as we are able to learn.[101]

Of the smash, even Jerry Thomas speaks slightingly. He says, “This beverage is simply a julep on a small plan.” It, however, can boast of three species—gin, brandy, and whiskey, and for all a small bar-glass must be used. It is usual, though not apparently essential, to lay two small pieces of orange on the top, and to ornament with the berries of the season.

Toddy is the Hindustani tári tádi, or juice of the palmyra and cocoa-nut. Tar is the Hindustani word for a palm. It is the name given by Europeans to the sweet liquors produced by puncturing the spathes or stems of certain palms. In the West Indies toddy is obtained from the trunk of the Attalea cohune, a native of the Isthmus of Panama. In South-Eastern Asia the palms from which it is collected are the gomuti, cocoa-nut, palmyra, date, and the kittul (Caryota urens). When newly drawn the liquor is clear, and in taste resembles malt. In a very short time it becomes turbid, whitish, and sub-acid, quickly running into the various stages of fermentation, and acquiring an intoxicating quality.

In our use of the word, toddy seems to mean nothing more than spirit and water sweetened, with the occasional addition of lemon peel. Whiskey toddy is the common and favourite species, though there are also apple, gin, and brandy toddies. Toddy differs from grog in being always made with boiling water, but this distinction is not universally maintained, nor, indeed, used by the best authors. Whiskey is probably the “vulgar” kind alluded to by Anstey in his Pleader’s Guide, Lect. 7.

“First count’s for that with divers jugs,

To wit, twelve pots, twelve cups, twelve mugs,

Of certain vulgar drink called toddy,

Said Gull did sluice said Gudgeon’s body.”

The names of American drinks form an amusing study. Passing over the well known sleepers, sifters, flosters, knickerbockers, ching-chings, Alabama fog-cutters and thunderbolt cocktails, the lightning smashes and eye-openers of Connecticut, the corpse revivers, the Mother Shiptons and the Maiden’s Prayers, we propose to give a list of some of the most remarkable titles, with receipts added, to satisfy the appetite of any who care to compound them.

A Yard of Flannel.

A yard of flannel, otherwise called egg flip.—Boil a quart of ale in a tinned saucepan. Beat up yolks of four with the whites of two eggs. Add four tablespoonfuls of brown sugar and a soupçon of nutmeg. Pour on this by degrees the hot ale, taking care to prevent mixture from curdling. Pour back and forward repeatedly, raising the hand as high as possible. This produces the frothing and smoothness essential to the goodness of the drink. It is called a yard of flannel from its fleecy appearance.

White Tiger’s Milk

(à la Thomas Dunn English, Esq.).

Half a gill apple jack, ½ gill peach brandy, ½ teaspoonful aromatic tincture,[102] white of an egg well beaten. Sweeten with white sugar to taste. Pour the mixture into 1 quart of milk, stir well, and sprinkle with nutmeg. This receipt will make a quart of the compound.

Bottled Velvet

(à la Sir John Bayley).

A bottle of Moselle, ½ a pint of sherry, small quantity of lemon peel, 2 tablespoonfuls of sugar. Well mix, add a sprig of verbena, strain, and ice.

Stone Fence.

One wine glass of whiskey (Bourbon), 2 small lumps of ice. Use large bar-glass, and fill up with sweet cider.

Sleeper.

To a gill of old rum add 1 ounce of sugar, 2 yolks of eggs, and the juice of half a lemon. Boil ½ a pint of water with 6 cloves, 6 coriander seeds, and a bit of cinnamon. Whisk all together, and strain into a tumbler.

Rumfustian.

Whisk yolks of a dozen eggs, and put into a quart of beer and a pint of gin. Put a bottle of sherry into a saucepan, with a stick of cinnamon, a grated nutmeg, a dozen lumps of sugar, and the thin rind of a lemon. When the wine boils, pour it on gin and beer, and drink hot.

Bimbo Punch.

Steep in 1 quart cognac brandy 6 lemons, cut in thin slices, for six hours. Then remove lemon without squeezing. Dissolve 1 pound loaf sugar in 1 quart boiling water, and add this hot solution to the cognac. Let it cool.

Bishop.

Stick an orange full of cloves, and roast it. When brown, cut it in quarters, and pour over it 1 quart of hot port. Add sugar to taste, and let mixture simmer for half an hour.

Archbishop.

The same as Bishop, with substitution of best claret for port.

Cardinal.

The same as Archbishop, with substitution of champagne for claret.

Pope.

The same as Cardinal, with substitution of Burgundy for champagne.

Locomotive.

Put 2 yolks of eggs into a goblet with 1 oz. of honey, a little essence of cloves, and a liqueur glass of Curaçoa; add 1 pint of high Burgundy made hot, whisk together, and serve hot in glasses.

Pousse l’Amour.

Fill a small wineglass half full of maraschino, then put in yolk of 1 egg; in this pour vanilla cordial, and dash the surface with cognac.

Blue Blazer

(use two large silver-plated mugs with handles).

One wine glass Scotch whiskey, 1 ditto boiling water. Mix whiskey and water in one mug; ignite, and, while blazing, pour from one mug to the other. Sweeten to taste, and serve in a bar tumbler, with a piece of lemon peel. Blue Blazer is really nothing more than ordinary whiskey and water.

Black Stripe.

Into a small bar-glass pour 1 wine glass of Santa Cruz rum and 1 tablespoonful of molasses; cool with shaved ice, or fill up with boiling water, according to season. Grate nutmeg on top. This is ordinary rum and water.

The following appeared in Moonshine, and may fitly conclude our chapter on American drinks, for which the verdant English youth has paid to the cunning dispenser so many nimble ninepences:—

“Thou art thirsty, Amaryllis; say to what dost thou incline?

Wilt thou toy with amber bubbles at the Fons Burtonis brink?

Shall I crown the crystal goblet with the flashing Rhenish wine?

Or it may be thou would’st wish for an American long drink?

Shall I brew a Flash of Lightning or a Bourbon Whiskey-skin?

Or a Saratoga Brace-up? Sweetest, you have but to say.

Nay, perhaps a Bottle Cocktail would your kind approval win?

Or a Santa Cruz Rum Daisy will be something in your way?

I can recommend a Morning-Glory Cocktail to your taste

And a Corker or a Nerver there are few who will despise;

Tom and Jerry offers pleasures it were folly rank to waste;

In a Nectar for the dog-days sweet Elysian rapture lies.