The treatment of Champagne after it comes from the wine-press—The racking and blending of the wine—The proportions of red and white vintages composing the ‘cuvée’—Deficiency and excess of effervescence—Strength and form of Champagne bottles—The ‘tirage’ or bottling of the wine—The process of gas-making commences—Details of the origin and development of the effervescent properties of Champagne—The inevitable breakage of bottles which ensues—This remedied by transferring the wine to a lower temperature—The wine stacked in piles—Formation of sediment—Bottles placed ‘sur pointe’ and daily shaken to detach the deposit—Effect of this occupation on those incessantly engaged in it—The present system originated by a workman of Madame Clicquot’s—‘Claws’ and ‘masks’—Champagne cellars—Their construction and aspect—Raw recruits for the ‘Regiment de Champagne’—Transforming the ‘vin brut’ into Champagne—Disgorging and liqueuring the wine—The composition of the liqueur—Variation in the quantity added to suit diverse national tastes—The corking, stringing, wiring, and amalgamating—The wine’s agitated existence comes to an end—The bottles have their toilettes made—Champagne sets out on its beneficial pilgrimage round the world.
THE special characteristic of Champagne is that its manufacture only commences where that of other wines ordinarily ends. No one would recognise in the still brut fluid—which, after being duly racked and fined, has somewhat the taste and colour of an acrid Rhine wine, with a more or less pronounced bitter flavour—that exhilarating essence which is capable of raising the most depressed spirits, and imparting gaiety to the dismallest gatherings. Much as Champagne may stand indebted to Nature, soil, climate, and species of vine, the sparkling fluid has contracted a far greater debt towards man, to whose incessant labour, patient skill, and minute precautions it owes that combination of qualities which causes it to be so highly prized.
In the preceding chapter we left the newly-expressed must flowing direct from the press into capacious reservoirs, whence it is drawn off into large vats, where it clears itself by depositing its mucous lees, usually within twenty-four hours. It is then transferred to new or perfectly clean casks, holding some forty gallons each, in which a sulphur match has been previously burnt. These casks are not filled quite up to the bunghole, which is generally covered with a vine-leaf kept in its place by a piece of tile. The bulk of the newly-made wine is left to repose at the vendangeoirs until the commencement of the following year; still, when the vintage is over, numbers of long narrow carts laden with casks of newly-expressed must may be seen rolling along the dusty highways, bound for those towns and villages in the department of the Marne where the manufacture of Champagne is carried on, and where the leading firms have their establishments. Chief amongst these is the cathedral city of Reims, after which comes the rising town of Epernay, stretching to the very verge of the river; then Ay, nestling between the vine-clad slopes and the Marne canal, with the neighbouring village of Mareuil; next Pierry; and finally Avize, in the centre of the white-grape district southwards of Epernay. Châlons, owing to its distance from the vineyards, does not usually draw its supply of wine until the new year.
In the vast celliers of the manufacturers’ establishments, where a temperature of about 60 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit usually prevails, the wine undergoes its first fermentation, entailing a loss of about 7 ½ per cent, and lasting from a fortnight to a month, according as to whether the wine be mou—that is, rich in sugar—or the reverse. In the former case fermentation naturally lasts much longer than when the wine is vert or green. This active fermentation is converted into latent fermentation by transferring the wine to a cooler cellar, as it is essential it should retain a certain proportion of its natural saccharine to insure its future effervescence. The casks have previously been completely filled, and their bungholes tightly stopped, a necessary precaution to guard the wine from absorbing oxygen, the effect of which would be to turn it yellow, and cause it to lose some of its lightness and perfume. After being racked and fined—an operation generally performed about the third week in December—the produce of the different vineyards is ready for mixing together in accordance with the traditional theories of the various manufacturers; and should the vintage have been an indifferent one, a certain proportion of old reserved wine of a good year enters into the blend.
The mixing is usually effected in gigantic vats holding at times as many as 12,000 gallons each, and having fan-shaped appliances inside, which, on being worked by handles, insure a complete amalgamation of the wine. This process of marrying wine on a gigantic scale is technically known as making the cuvée. Usually four-fifths of wine obtained from black grapes, and now of a pale-pink hue, are tempered by one-fifth of the juice of white ones. It is necessary that the first should comprise a more or less powerful dash of the finer growths both of the Mountain of Reims and of the River; while, as regards the latter, one or other of the delicate vintages of the Côte d’Avize is essential to the perfect cuvée. The aim is to combine and develop the special qualities of the respective crus, body and vinosity being secured by the red vintages of Bouzy and Verzenay, softness and roundness by those of Ay and Dizy, and lightness, delicacy, and effervescence by the white growths of Avize and Cramant. The proportions are never absolute, but vary according to the manufacturer’s style of wine and the taste of the countries which form his principal markets. In the opinion of some clever amalgamators, a blend comprising one-third of the vintages of Sillery, Verzenay, and Bouzy, one-third of those of Mareuil, Ay, and Dizy, and the remaining third composed of the produce of Pierry, Cramant, and Avize, constitutes the wine of Champagne par excellence. Others not less expert declare that a simple mixture of the Ay, Pierry, and Cramant vintages furnishes a perfect wine. As when this blending takes place the wine is only imperfectly fermented and exceedingly crude, the reader may imagine the delicacy and discrimination of palate requisite to judge of the flavour, finesse, and bouquet which the cuvée is likely eventually to develop.
These, however, are not the only matters to be considered. There is, above everything, the effervescence, which depends upon the quantity of carbonic acid gas the wine already contains, and the further quantity it is likely to develop, which depends upon the amount of its natural saccharine. After the bottling, if the gas be present in excess, there will be a shattering of bottles and a flooding of cellars; while, on the other hand, if there be a paucity, the corks will refuse to pop, and the wine to sparkle aright in the glass. The amount of saccharine in the cuvée has therefore to be accurately ascertained by means of a glucometer; and should it fail to reach the required standard, as is the case at times when the season has been wet and cold and the vintage a poor one, the deficiency is made up by the addition of the purest sugar-candy. If, on the other hand, there be an excess of saccharine, the only thing to be done is to defer the final blending and bottling of the wine until the superfluous saccharine matter has been absorbed by fermentation in the cask.