The view from the summit of this ridge is, nevertheless, remarkably fine. It embraces the whole extent of the bay of Cadiz; the bright towns which stand upon its margin; the curiously intersected country that cuts them off from each other; and the winding courses of the Guadalete and Santi Petri.
The slope of the hill is very gradual on the side facing Xeres, and the view is tame in comparison with that in the opposite direction. The road, which traverses a country covered with corn and olives, is carriageable throughout; but there is a better route, which turns the Sierra to the eastward, keeping nearer the marshes of the Guadalete. The distance from Puerto Santa Maria to Xeres, by the direct road, is nine miles; by the post route, ten.
Xeres is situated in the lap of two rounded hillocks, which shelter it to the east and west; and it covers a considerable extent of ground. The city, properly so called, is embraced by an old crenated Moorish wall, which, though enclosing a labyrinth of narrow, ill-built, and worse drained streets, is of no great circuit, and is so intermixed with the houses of the suburbs, as to be visible only here and there. The limits of the ancient town are well defined, however, by the numerous gateways still standing, and which, from the augmented size of the place, appear to be scattered about it without any object. Some of the old buildings and narrow streets are very sketchy, and the number of gables and chimneys cannot fail to strike one who has been long accustomed to the flat-roofed cities of Andalusia.
The principal merchants of the place reside mostly in the suburbs; where, besides having greater space for their necessarily extensive premises, their wine stores are better situated for ventilation; a very important auxiliary in bringing the juice of the grape to a due state of perfection. The numerous clean and lofty stores, interspersed with commodious and well-built houses, gardens, greenhouses, &c., give the suburbs an agreeable, refreshing appearance. But it is needful to walk the streets with nose in air, and eyes fixed on things above; for, though much wider, and consequently more freely exposed to the action of the sun and air, than those of the circumvallated city, they are yet more filthy, and quite as nauseating. Now and then, indeed, a generous brown sherry odour salutes the third sense, counteracting, in some degree, the unwholesome effects of the noxious cloacal miasms. But the bad scents prevail in the proportion of ten to one; and, like the far-famed distilling city of Cologne, Xeres seems to have bottled up, and hermetically sealed, all its sweets for exportation.
The population of the place is enormous—being estimated at no less than 50,000 souls. But the amount is subject to great variations, dependant on the recentness of the last endemic fever, generated in its pestiferous gutters. The inhabitants are all, more or less, connected with the wine trade—which is the only thing thought of or talked of in the place.
The store-houses are all above ground. They are immense buildings, having lofty roofs supported on arches, springing from rows of slender columns; and their walls are pierced with numerous windows, to admit of a thorough circulation of air. Some are so large as to be capable of containing 4000 butts, and are cool, even in the most sultry weather. The exhalations are, nevertheless, rather overcoming, even unaided by the numerous samples, of which one is tempted to make trial. The number of butts annually made, or, more correctly speaking, collected, at Xeres, amounts to 30,000. Of this number, one half is exported to England, and includes the produce of nearly all the choicest vineyards of Xeres; for, in selecting their wines for shipment, the Xeres houses carefully avoid mixing their first-growth wines with those of lighter quality, collected from the vineyards of Moguer, San Lucar, and Puerto Real; or even with such as are produced on their own inferior grounds.
The remaining 15,000 butts are in part consumed in the country; where a light wine, having what is called a Manzanilla[36] flavour, is preferred—or sold to the shippers from other places, where they are generally mixed with inferior wines.
The total number of butts shipped, annually, from the different ports round the bay of Cadiz, may be taken at the following average—
| From | Xeres | 15,000 | almost all to England. |
| " | Puerto Santa Maria | 12,000 | chiefly to England and the United States. |
| " | Chiclana | 3,000 | principally to the Habana, the Ports of Mexico, and Buenos Ayres. |
| " | Puerto Real | 500 | |
| Total | 30,500 |
But, besides the above, a prodigious quantity of wine finds its way to England from Moguer and San Lucar, which one never hears of but under the common denomination of Sherry.