WINES, with a heading which runs thus:—
"Good Wine to man is what manure is to
trees. Pure Wine makes good blood. A
glass of good Wine purges off distempers. A
cellar without good Wine, a house without
woman, and a purse without money, are the
three deadly plagues." This chapter is a
brief diatribe against factitious Wines and
spirits. Our friend's advice may be safely
taken:—" We entreat you," he says, " to
avoid this trash as poison. Recollect, too,
that no one would suffer putrid meat to be
set before a friend, and false wine is in every
respect as abhorrent to real hospitality;
indeed, bad wine is the guest's horror and the
host's disgrace." The corollary to this
proposition naturally follows:—" The best thing
for persons really not first-rate judges of
wine, is to deal with persons of honour and
integrity, who are judges of wine," &c.—like
Our Wine Merchant.

CHAPTER III.—OF PORT WINE— "The
bees-wing in Port is the wine-seller's pater
noster." Our Wine Merchant is justly indignant
with those "cheats"—he calls them—
the grocers and fruiterers, who sell sham
Port at one-and-sixpence per bottle; and,
with a knowledge of the subject which seems
almost marvellously intuitive, bitterly
denounces the conduct of those who manufacture
Port Wine out of "Red Cape, sandars-wood,
elder-berries, alcohol, sloes,
gum-dragon, cider, salt of tartar, and other
ingredients of a like character." We make no
question that " our premises " would " burst
their marble cerements," if such base
compounds were—even surreptitiously—
introduced into " our cellars." But having got
hold of a bottle of the real stuff—and we
know now where it is to be had—we are
taught how to decant and then how to drink
it. The first process having been got through,
with a few grammatical inaccuracies, certain
points are insisted on. After premising that
"all Port Wine drinkers invariably hold up
their glasses and look through them," Our
Wine Merchant, with great gallantry,
remarks:—"All glasses, and particularly Port
wine glasses, should be of large size, because
ladies always ask for half a-glass of wine, and
it is unmannerly, except upon particular
occasions, to fill brimmers; therefore, if the
glasses are too small, they are a
tantalization, and give the idea of meanness and
begrudging, and all glasses should be scrupulously
clean and perfect, and without flaw or
chip. In all wine-drinking three senses are
gratified at once—the taste, the smell, and
the sight—and they must all be provided for."
He dismisses Port wine, for which he
manifestly has himself a great relish, by observing,
"It is always a useful and acceptable wine to
most persons, and a glass of Port wine and a
biscuit, taken regularly at mid-day, is a
capital thing for growing boys and girls delicate
in health."

OF SHERRY, CHAPTER IV., we learn that
"The bitter in Sherry is the haut goût of the
wine;" that " it should be in or near the
dinner-table, from the soup to the end of the
entertainment;" that " it is proper to be
served occasionally at all evening parties, at
balls, and invariably at suppers; while two
glasses of Sherry in a tumbler of pure cold
water, with or without a little sugar, is, either
for sight or taste, one of the most beautiful
things in the world." Our Wine Merchant
adds:—" East India Sherry is among the very
best of wines, and should always form part of
the wines at any entertainment." On
reference to page fifty-six of the Vade Mecum, we
find an "old, dry, pale East India" marked
at from forty-eight to sixty shillings per dozen.
Reasonable enough in all conscience.

MADEIRA, the rapid disappearance of which
Our Wine Merchant deplores, supplies him
with a comment, which also affords him an
opportunity of shining as a linguist:—"A
glass of Madeira after the soup course at
dinner is really delicious. The French, who
seldom drink (vins étrangers) wines not of
their own country, drink Madeira in this
way, and occasionally during dinner; and it
is a magniticent wine, and particularly for
persons of mature age."

We come now to the wine—CHAPTER VI.
—on which, or by means of which, all are
eloquent. " Champagne," poetically exclaims
our friend, " looks with Peacock's eyes, and
every eye a diamond." We have nothing to
find fault with in his account of this " King
of Wines," as he calls it, but with respect to
its treatment before it comes to table, must
observe that Our Wine Merchant's theory is
better than his practice. "Effervescing
Champagne," he informs us, " will lose that
quality if the bottles are stood on end, or
placed upright; and therefore they must be
carefully piled, with the same sides
downwards as they have previously had. The best
way is to keep all champagne in the case in
which it arrives, with the proper side up, and
taken out just before it is wanted."

We think, if our memory serves us, that
when we peeped into the Emporium, we
saw a few bottles of the "Peacock's eye"
standing in the reprehensible manner above
described. Those, however, were probably
only samples, a mere waste of the wealth
with which the cellars below were
overflowing. Did the reader ever hear of
"Champagne Salad?" Here is Our Wine
Merchant's recipe for it. " They (the French)
also make Champagne Salad, consisting of
strawberries, raspberries, grapes, currants,
gooseberries, morsels of melon or pine-apple,
(or such of these as are the dessert) placed
in a bowl and covered thickly with pounded
loaf-sugar, upon which is poured a bottle of
champagne, and then some small globules of
transparent ice are placed about in the Salad;
nothing can be more delicious and refreshing,
and all the ladies like it." Here is another
of the uses of the "Peacock's eye:" "Nothing