Three seasons in European vineyards : treating of vineculture; vine disease and its cure; wine-making and wines, red and white; wine-drinking, as affecting health and morals

Front matter

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Preface

X THIN'K my work will be found in some degree interesting to the general reader, if he have curiosity, which Hume defines as " the love of learning."

I think, too, it may prove instructive to the general drinker as well, inasmuch as it relates to his daily beverages, and their effects on liis health and happiness.

But my chief aim has been to convey information, both practical and theoretical, bearmg on the important matter of wine-growing in America. Liasmuch as such information has of necessity got interwoven and somewhat entangled throughout the whole texture of the narrative, and might consequently be difficult to refer to, I have added an index, which will help the reader to search out what he may need to find, under the several heads of "planting," "training," " pruning," etc.

To the same end, I would here indicate, in advance, a few of the more important matters which iv Preface.

will be found mentioned here and there, and not always just where they ought.

These are :

1. Long pruning, which, as commonly practiced in America, I deem to have been an efficient cause for the decay of our vines.

2. Drainage, the want of which, especially in the Ohio Valley, I feel quite certain has been equally injurious.

3. The advantage of growing wine on plains rather than on hills, except where the quality obtained from hill-grown vines is such as will compensate for their larger cost and smaller yield.

4. Training in low souche, and without stakes, as probably better adapted to our warm summers than the expensive methods imitated from countries where peaches can only be ripened on trees flattened and fastened to the south sides of high walls.

5. Red wine, as preferable to white, for the future beverage of Americans.

6. The sulphur-cm-e, as entirely efficacious against the disease of the vine in all its many forms, if only well applied.

Chapter I

Bordeaux, the City of Wine. — Rosa Bonheiir's Horses. — Bewildering first Lessons in Vine-culture Page 9

CHAPTER 11.

A French Vineyard. — Crazy Vines, with no means of Support. — Slanders against French Wine. — Defenseless Fields 15

Chapter III

Aquitaine. — Fanciful Theories. — How French People drink Wine, take Brandy, and use Water. — Sterne's Diligence and the simple Nuns. — Evening Scenes in the Kitchen. — Brandy Merchants. — Soil.— Cultivation. — Whisky is not Brandy 24

Chapter IV

Medoc. — Vintage Feast. — Vintage Dance. — "A discretion." — Frenchmen kind to their Beasts. — Soil. — Plowing. — Training. — La Tour. — Making Wine. — Stemming Grapes. — Crushing with Feet. — Fermenting. — Filling up. — Dra^\ang off. — A Glass of the hest Red Wine in the World. — Pichon-Longueville. — Lafitte and its Pehhles. — Leoville. — Cos d'Estournel. — Pomys. — Six Classes of Wine and a Bourgeois Superieure 34

Chapter V

The Sauterne District. — Soil. — Cultm'e. — Severe Leaf-pruning. — Three Vintages. — Head, Middle and Tail Wines. — Frenchmen eat beautifully 68 vi Contents,

Chapter VI

Languedoc. — Pursuing Knowledge by the slow Train. — Third-class Passengers. — Good Skeletons of the Peasantry. — Beziers. — Wine and Brandy making. — Low Souche Training Page 71

Chapter VII

Burgundy and the Cote d'or. — Eirst taste and last. — Disorderly Vines. — Layering. — Wages. — Wine-making. — Plaster of Paris. — Opposing Systems as to Stemming Grapes. — Crushing Avith Feet — and worse. — Good Men and good Wine. — Quantity and Quality. — Long Pruning ruinous. — Soils of the Cote d'or. — Mode of Planting. — Layering. — Vine-disease. — Red Wine. — What it has done for the French and what it will do for us 78

Chapter VIII

Epernay. — Catacombs of Bottles. — Sparkling Wine. — How compounded, doctored and dosed. — Americans should learn for themselves how to make it lOG

Chapter IX

The Great Exhibition. — Foreign Drinkers and American Drinks. — Falsification of Wines. — False Wines and true, and the Drunkai-d's Thirst. — Distribution of Prizes. — Pasteur and his discoveiy. — Euge'nie 118

Chapter X

Rheims. — Chalk, Mutton, and Champagne. — Tliick-set Vines. — St. Thierry. — Charlemagne and the Nuns. — A serene Home and its resident Proprietor. — Layeiing again. — Three Cures for the Vine-disease. — Old Vines and new. — High Vines and low. — Soil. — Cultivation 148

Montpellier and Mares. — Cette. — Muscat of Frontignan. — Visit to a Vineyard in low Souche. — Visit to another of 250 Acres. — Frost. — The Foster-brothei*. — American Vines in Languedoc— Wine-making 284

Chapter XVIII

Would low Souche Vines do well in America ? — Our Climate warm enough. — Present Modes too expensive. — A glut of Wine to be feared and hoped for 301 viii Contents.

CHAPTEE XIX.

How they plant Vines in Souche. — Good Reasons for five-feet Spacing. — Cuttings. — Pruning and Training. — Bringing old Souches into shape Page 309