The converted Marshal replies on October 25th: ‘I was in the wrong to ask you to bottle my wine so that it might be mousseux; it is a fashion that prevails everywhere, especially amongst young people. For my own part, I care very little about it; but I wish the wine to be clear and fine, and to have a strong Champagne bouquet.’ In the following December Bertin, in answer to the Marshal’s request for three quartaux of wine, says: ‘Will you kindly let me know at what date you propose to drink this wine? If it is to be drunk as mousseux, I shall not agree with you.’
The allusion to the time of year at which the wine was to be drunk throws a light upon a practice of the day, confirmed by other passages in this correspondence. Much of the wine made was drunk as vin bourru fined, but not racked off, at the beginning of the year, or as tocane, which was apt to go off if kept beyond Shrovetide. This speedy consumption and the careful choice made of the grapes intended for vin mousseux militated against the formation in the bottles of that deposit, which, up to the commencement of the present century, when the system of dégorgeage was introduced, could only be remedied by dépotage,[127] though, as we have seen, the Abbey of Hautvillers had a secret method, carefully guarded, of checking its formation.[128]
It is singular that the presence of a natural liqueur—the consequence of a complete but not excessive ripeness of the grape, and at present considered one of the highest qualities of the wine—was, at the commencement of the eighteenth century, regarded as a disease. The Mémoire of 1718 states that when the wine has any liqueur, however good it may otherwise be, it is not esteemed, and recommends the owner to get rid of this ‘bad quality’ forthwith by putting a pint of new milk warm from the cow into each pièce, stirring it well, letting it rest three days, and then racking the wine off. At this epoch the wine of the Champagne seems to have been preferred perfectly dry.[129] In June 1716 the Marshal d’Artagnan reproached Bertin du Rocheret for sending him Hautvillers wine of the preceding vintage which had turned out liquoreuse. However, in August he felt forced to write that it had become excellent, and similar experiences seem to have soon removed all prejudices against this liqueur character. Bertin, in 1725, speaks of it as one of the qualities of wine, and charges for it in proportion; and six years later remarks that the English are as mad for liqueur and colour in their wines as the French.[130]
