Host and Guest

by A. V. Kirwan

A good glass of genuine Madeira which has gone the rounds, is good after soup, but the wine is no longer fashionable.

The only Italian wines worth drinking are the Montefiascone, Montepulciano, and Vino d’Asti. Many of these wines are too harsh, and some of them are too thick and sweet for a French or English palate.

Some of the wines of Hungary are very tolerable. The Tokay wine is exquisite. Even the Maslas, which is a diluted Tokay, is a splendid wine; soft, oily, and stomachic. A glass of it may be had any day after dinner, at about 10d. or 1s. English, in the Speise Saal of the Schwann, at Vienna, where I in my youth consumed many a bottle of Tokay. The Vermuth is a stomachic mixture, too much bepraised by those who have never tasted it; indeed, as much overpraised as the Crême d’Absinthe. All the Greek wines are also over-rated. There are tuns of them not worth the amount of a farrier’s yearly bill for shoeing a dog; or if you wish the Gallic phrase, “ne valent pas les quatres fers d’un chien.”

The Constantia wine of the Cape, though much liked by Frenchmen of seventy and upwards, and Frenchwomen above forty, never can be generally a favourite with Englishmen. There are some few Russian wines. At Kaffa, in the Crimea, they produce a Champagne very nearly as good as either the growth of the Borough or Lambeth.

Of New South Wales wines a word or two. I learned with much pleasure that the French, and all other wines, are now tried in that colony; and that the climate is particularly well suited to the growth of the vine. The preparation and keeping of the wine must, however, be much more attended to than heretofore. At the Cape, too, the English wine-growers have gone on very progressively from year to year in ameliorating their Pontacs. The best white Capes fetch, since their flinty character is diminishing, prices as high as Sherries of middling qualities. Such prices were, however, encouraged perhaps by the import duties on colonial wine being only half the amount levied on foreign grown. As these Cape wines are now so pure as to mix well with Xeres wines, the conscientious London dealer, of course, largely availed himself of a colonial-grown article to mix with Sherry wines for English country consumption.

Two works have recently been published on wine, in which may be found chapters dedicated to the wines of Southern Africa, Greece, the Western Archipelago, and to the wines of Columbia, Australia, &c. But notwithstanding these efforts to introduce new vintages from Italy, Greece, Hungary, Australia, and Southern Africa, elderly and middle-aged men of the present generation are certain still to adhere to the old wines which their fathers and grandfathers consumed for the last half-century. It may, I think, even be doubted whether the use of any new vintages can become general (supposing them to be as good or better than the old) before the end of the present century or A.D. 1900, from which coming epoch we are still removed by an interval of seven and thirty years. It would, therefore, be the idlest of idle follies in me to recommend to any host to fill his cellar with new vintages of which his guests knew nothing, and which they might not relish. The aim of a host, now as heretofore, should be to have choice wines and liqueurs, all excellent of their kind. Persons of moderate fortune should look to the excellence of the quality of the wines, rather than to the variety of their stock. With good bins of Sherry, Madeira, Port, Claret (white and red), Champagne, Hock, and Burgundy, any gentleman is in a position to entertain his guests worthily. Larger quantities of Sherry, Port, Madeira, and first-rate Claret, may be laid in than of lighter wines, for of these latter the consumption will be necessarily less.

At most London dinners in the season, Champagne, Sauterne, Barsac, Rhenish and Moselle wines are produced; but of the four latter wines scarcely more than a bottle of each is used, though three or four bottles of Champagne may be consumed, in a party of twelve. But, notwithstanding that there is a more considerable consumption of Champagne than of other light wines, it is not advisable that any private gentleman should have a large stock of this wine in his cellar, as after a twelvemonth it is apt to get ropy, and to require fresh bottling. But of the vins de garde, such as Madeira, Sherry, Port, first-rate Claret, and Burgundy, a host may profitably cellar as large a quantity as his fortune will allow. Of one thing, however, every purchaser should convince himself before he purchases a single bottle, and that is, that it is impossible to have good wine at a low price. The finest vintages of wine are always scarce and dear; and the finest vintages must, like other and inferior vintages, be matured before they are fit to drink. A considerable efflux of time is necessary for this, so that there is interest on the original cost of the wine, as well as the interest on its keep, to be added to the prime or original cost. This is so if the wine be imported direct from the wine-grower; but if it be obtained from the merchant or dealer in this country, his profit, as well as the skill, labour, and industry he has applied, must all be additional items in the price. The idea of low-priced wine is therefore a mere myth; and, whether at the sales of private gentlemen’s stock or otherwise, good wine generally fetches its full value in London. It is said that, at the sales of deceased gentlemen in Dublin and Edinburgh, few wines, unless some exceedingly rare specimens, fetch above 60s. per dozen; but in London it is very common, at private sales, for Port and Sherry to fetch double as much as this.

The best way for any gentleman desiring to stock a cellar, is to go to a first-rate wine merchant of position and character. Such a man will deal honestly, and give his customer a good article, though he may charge what is called in the trade a long price for it. If gentlemen have personal friends or connections at Cadiz in whom they can confide to send them wine in the piece, they may lay in Amontillado, Montilla, or Manzinilla, at 10s. or 12s. a dozen less than they can obtain them of the wine merchants in England. Anything like a first-rate Amontillado sells among English wine merchants at from 72s. to 84s. the dozen, while Manzinilla and Montilla range at from 60s. to 70s.

Fabulous prices are given for old Ports and East India Sherries and Madeiras, at the sales of well-known connoisseurs in wine. Many East India Sherries have sold for nine and ten guineas a dozen, and much of the late Mr. Justice Talfourd’s Port went for eleven and twelve guineas a dozen. Though the wine was excellent, this was unquestionably a fancy price. There is no need to give so large a sum for old and first-rate Port. Any man of ordinary acumen and intelligence, in addressing himself to a first-rate wine house in London may have excellent, if not first-rate, Port at from three to four guineas a dozen, and considerably cheaper if he buys it in the wood.

First-rate Clarets have been rising in price during the last five or six years; but even in London first-rate Clarets ought to be and are procurable at from four to five guineas a dozen, and the best sparkling Champagne at about the same price, or a shade lower. Sillery Champagne of the very highest quality is sold by wine merchants at 6l. the dozen. Burgundies of the highest qualities are rare, and difficult to find good; but excellent Beaune and Chablis can be obtained at two guineas the dozen in London, and considerably cheaper if imported direct.