Sherry Wines--The Sherry District--Origin of the Name--Varieties of
Soil--Of Grapes--Pajarete--Rojas Clemente--Cultivation of
Vines--Best Vineyards--The Vintage--Amontillado--The Capataz--The
Bodega--Sherry Wine--Arrope and Madre Vino--A Lecture on Sherry in
the Cellar--at the Table--Price of Fine Sherry--Falsification of
Sherry--Manzanilla--The Alpistera.
Sherry, a wine which requires more explanation than many of its
consumers imagine, is grown in a limited nook of the Peninsula, on the
south-western corner of sunny Andalucia, which occupies a range of
country of which the town of Xerez is the capital and centre. The
wine-producing districts extend over a space which is included--consult
a map--within a boundary drawn from the towns of Puerto de Sª. Maria,
Rota, San Lucar, Tribujena, Lebrija, Arcos, and to the Puerto again. The
finest vintages lie in the immediate vicinity of Xerez, which has given
therefore its name to the general produce. The wine, however, becomes
inferior in proportion as the vineyards get more distant from this
central point.
[Sidenote: FOUR CLASSES OF SOIL.]
Although some authors--who, to show their learning, hunt for Greek
etymologies in every word--have derived sherry from Ξηρος, dry,
to have done so from the Persian Schiraz would scarcely have been more
far-fetched. _Sherris sack_, the term used by Falstaff, no mean
authority in this matter, is the precise _seco de Xerez_, the term by
which the wine is known to this day in its own country; the epithet
_seco_, or dry--the _seck_ of old English authors, and the _sec_ of
French ones--being used in contradistinction to the _sweet_ malvoisies
and muscadels, which are also made of the same grape. The wine, it is
said, was first introduced into England about the time of Henry VII.,
whose close alliance with Ferdinand and Isabella was cemented by the
marriage of his son with their daughter. It became still more popular
among us under Elizabeth, when those who sailed under Essex sacked
Cadiz in 1596, and brought home the fashion of good “sherris sack, from
whence,” as Sir John says, “comes valour.” The visit to Spain of Charles
I. contributed to keeping up among his countrymen this taste for the
drinks of the Peninsula, which extended into the provinces, as we find
Howell writing from York, in 1645, for “a barrell or two of oysters,
which shall be well eaten,” as he assures his friend, “with a cup of the
best sherry, to which this town is altogether addicted.” During the wars
of the succession, and those fatal quarrels with England occasioned by
the French alliance and family compact of Charles III., our consumption
of sherries was much diminished, and the culture of the vine and the
wine-making was neglected and deteriorated. It was restored at the end
of last century by the family of Gordon, whose houses at Xerez and the
Puerto most deservedly rank among the first in the country. The improved
quality of the wines was their own recommendation; but as fashion
influences everything, their vogue was finally established by Lord
Holland, who, on his return from Spain, introduced superlative sherry at
his undeniable table.
The quality of the wine depends on the grape and the soil, which has
been examined and analysed by competent chemists. Omitting minute and
uninteresting particulars, the first class and the best is termed the
_Albariza_; this whitish soil is composed of clay mixed with carbonate
of lime and silex. The second sort is called _Barras_, and consists of
sandy quartz, mixed with lime and oxide of iron. The third is the
_Arenas_, being, as the name indicates, little better than sand, and is
by far the most widely extended, especially about San Lucar, Rota, and
the back of Arcos; it is the most productive, although the wine is
generally coarse, thin, and ill-flavoured, and seldom improves after the
third year: it forms the substratum of those inferior sherries which are
largely exported to the discredit of the real article. The fourth class
of soil is limited in extent, and is the _Bugeo_, or dark-brown loamy
sand which occurs on the sides of rivulets and hillocks. The wine grown
on it is poor and weak; yet all the inferior produces of these different
districts are sold as sherry wines, to the great detriment of those
really produced near Xerez itself, which do not amount to a fifth of the
quantity exported.
[Sidenote: VINES OF ANDALUCIA.]
The varieties of the grape are far greater than those of the soil on
which they are grown. Of more than a hundred different kinds, those
called _Listan_ and _Palomina Blanca_ are the best. The increased demand
for sherry, where the producing surface is limited, has led to the
extirpation of many vines of an inferior kind, which have been replaced
by new ones whose produce is of a larger and better quality. The _Pedro
Ximenez_, or delicious sweet-tasted grape which is so celebrated, came
originally from Madeira, and was planted on the Rhine, from whence about
two centuries ago one Peter Simon brought it to Malaga, since when it
has extended over the south of Spain. It is of this grape that the rich
and luscious sweet wine called _Pajarete_ is made; a name which some
have erroneously derived from _Pajaros_, the birds, who are wont to pick
the ripest berries; but it was so called from the wine having been
originally only made at Paxarete, a small spot near Xerez: it is now
prepared everywhere, and thus the grapes are dried in the sun until they
almost become raisins, and the syrop quite inspissated, after that they
are pressed, and a little fine old wine and brandy is added. This wine
is extremely costly, as it is much used in the rearing and maturation of
young sherry wines.
There is an excellent account of all the vines of Andalucia by Rojas
Clemente. This able naturalist disgraced himself by being a base toady
of the wretched minion Godoy, and by French partisanship, which is high
treason to his own country. Accordingly, to please his masters, he
“contrasts the frank generosity, the vivacity, and genial cordiality of
the Xerezanos, with the sombre stupidity and ferocious egotism of the
insolent people on the banks of the Thames,” by whom he had just before
been most hospitably welcomed. This worthy gentleman wrote, however,
within sight of Trafalgar, and while a certain untoward event was
rankling in his and his estimable patron’s bosom.
[Sidenote: THE VINTAGE.]
The vines are cultivated with the greatest care, and demand unceasing
attention, from the first planting to their final decay. They generally
fruit about the fifth year, and continue in full and excellent bearing
for about thirty-five years more, when the produce begins to diminish
both in quantity and in quality. The best wines are produced from the
slowest ripening grapes; the vines are delicate, have a true bacchic
hydrophobia, or antipathy to water--are easily affected and injured by
bad smells and rank weeds. The vine-dresser enjoys little rest; at one
time the soil must be trenched and kept clean, then the vines must be
pruned, and tied to the stakes, to which they are trained very low; anon
insects must be destroyed; and at last the fruit has to be gathered and
crushed. It is a life of constant care, labour, and expense.
The highest qualities of flavour depend on the grape and soil, and as
the favoured spots are limited, and the struggle and competition for
their acquisition great, the prices paid are always high, and
occasionally extravagantly so; the proprietors of vineyards are very
numerous, and the surface is split and partitioned into infinite petty
ownerships. Even the _Pago de Macharnudo_, the finest of all, the Clos
de Vougeot, the Johannisberg of Xerez, is much subdivided; it consists
of 1200 _aranzadas_, one of which may be taken as equivalent to our
acre, being, however, that quantity of land which can be ploughed with a
pair of bullocks in a day--of these 1200, 460 belong to the great house
of Pedro Domecq, and their mean produce may be taken at 1895 butts, of
which some 350 only will run very fine. Among the next most renowned
_pagos_, or wine districts, may be cited Carrascal, Los Tercios,
Barbiana _alta y baja_, Añina, San Julian, Mochiele, Carraola, Cruz del
Husillo, which lie in the immediate _termino_ or boundary of Xerez;
their produce always ensures high prices in the market. Many of these
vineyards are fenced with canes, the _arundo donax_, or with aloes,
whose stiff-pointed leaves form palisadoes that would defy a regiment of
dragoons, and are called by the natives the devil’s toothpicks; in
addition, the _capataz del campo_, or country bailiff, is provided, like
a keeper, with large and ferocious dogs, who would tear an intruder to
pieces. The fruit when nearly mature is especially watched; for,
according to the proverb, it requires much vigilance to take care of
ripe grapes and maidens--_Niñas y vinos, son mal de guardar_.
[Sidenote: THE VINTAGE.]
When the period of the vintage arrives, the cares of the proprietors and
the labours of the cultivators and makers increase. The bunches are
picked and spread out for some days on mattings; the unripe grapes,
which have less substance and spirit, are separated, and are exposed
longer to the sun, by which they improve. If the berries be over-ripe,
then the saccharine prevails, and there is a deficiency of tartaric
acid. The selected grapes are sprinkled with lime, by which the watery
and acetous particles are absorbed and corrected. A nice hand is
requisite in this powdering, which, by the way, is an ancient African
custom, in order to avoid the imputation of Falstaff, “There is lime in
this sack.” The treading out the fruit is generally done by night,
because it is then cooler, and in order to avoid as much as possible the
plague of wasps, by whom the half-naked operators are liable to be
stung. On the larger vineyards there is generally a jumble of buildings,
which contain every requisite for making the wine, as well as cellars
into which the must or pressed grape juice is left to pass the stages of
fermentation, and where it remains until the following spring before it
is removed from the lees. “When the new wine is racked off, all the
produce of the same vineyard and vintage is housed together, and called
a _partido_ or lot.
[Sidenote: MANUFACTURE OF SHERRY.]
The vintage, which is the all-absorbing, all-engrossing moment of the
year, occupies about a fortnight, and is earlier in the Rota districts
than at Xerez, where it commences about the 20th of September; into
these brief moments the hearts, bodies, and souls of men are condensed;
even Venus, the queen of neighbouring Cadiz, and who during the other
three hundred and fifty-one days of the year, allies herself willingly
to Bacchus, is now forgotten. Nobles and commoners, merchants and
priests, talk of nothing but wine, which then and there monopolises man,
and is to Xerez what the water is at Grand Cairo, where the rising of
the Nile is at once a pleasure and a profit. When the vintage is
concluded, the custom-house officers take note in their respective
districts of the quantity produced on each vineyard, to whom it is sold,
and where it is taken to; nor can it be resold or removed afterwards,
without a permit and a charge of a four per cent. ad valorem duty. It
need not be said, that in a land where public officers are inadequately
paid, where official honesty and principle are all but unknown, a bribe
is all-sufficient; false returns are regularly made, and every trick
resorted to to facilitate trade, and transfer revenue into the pockets
of the collectors, rather than into the Queen’s treasury; thus are
defeated the vexations and extortions of commerce-hampering excise, to
hate which seems to be a second nature in man all over the world.
Commissioners excepted. In the first year a decided difference takes
place in these new wines; some become _bastos_ or coarse, others sour
and others good; those only which exhibit great delicacy, body, and
flavour are called _finos_ or fine; in a lot of one hundred butts,
rarely more than from ten to fifteen can be calculated as deserving this
epithet, and it is to the high price paid for these by the
_almacenistas_ or storers of wines, that the grower looks for
remuneration; the qualities of the wines usually produced in each
particular _termino_ or district do not vary much; they have their
regular character and prices among the trade, by whom they are perfectly
understood and exactly valued.
These singular changes in the juice of grapes grown on the same
vineyard, invariably take place, although no satisfactory reason has
been yet assigned; the chemical processes of nature have hitherto defied
the investigations of man, and in nothing more than in the elaboration
of that lusus naturæ vel Bacchi, that variety of flavour which goes by
the name of _amontillado_; this has been given to it from its
resemblance in dryness and quality to the wines of _Montilla_, near
Cordova: the latter, be it observed, are scarcely known in England at
all, nor indeed in Spain, except in their own immediate neighbourhood,
where they supply the local consumption. This _amontillado_, when the
genuine production of nature, is very valuable, as it is used in
correcting young Sherry wines, which are running over sweet; it is very
scarce, since out of a hundred butts of _vino fino_, not more than five
will possess its properties. Much of the wine which is sold in London as
pure _amontillado_, is a fictitious preparation, and made up for the
British market.
[Sidenote: THE CAPATAZ.]
All sherries are a matured mixture of grape juice; champagne itself is a
manufactured wine; nor does it much matter, provided a palateable and
wholesome beverage be produced. In all the leading and respectable
houses, the wine is prepared from grapes grown in the district, nor is
there the slightest mystery made in explaining the artificial processes
which are adopted; the rearing, educating and finishing, as it were, of
these wines, is a work of many years, and is generally intrusted to the
_Capataz_, the chief butler, or head man, who very often becomes the
real master; this important personage is seldom raised in Andalucia, or
in any wine-growing districts of Spain; he generally is by birth an
Asturian, or a native of the mountains contiguous to Santander, from
whence the chandlers and grocers, hence called _Los Montañeses_, are
supplied throughout the Peninsula. These Highlanders are celebrated for
the length of their pedigrees, and the tasting properties of their
tongues; we have more than once in Estremadura and Leon fallen in with
flights of these ragged gentry, wending, Scotch-like, to the south in
search of fortune; few had shoes or shirts, yet almost every one carried
his family parchment in a tin case, wherein his descent from
Tubal--respectable, although doubtful--was proven to be as evident as
the sun is at noon day.
These gentlemen of good birth and better taste seldom smoke, as the
narcotic stupifying weed deadens papillatory delicacy. Now as few
wine-masters in Spain would give up the cigar to gain millions, the
_Capataz_ soon becomes the sole possessor of the secrets of the cellar;
and as no merchants possess vineyards of their own sufficient to supply
their demand, the purchases of new wines must be made by this
confidential servant, who is thus enabled to cheat both the grower and
his own employer, since he will only buy of those who give him the
largest commission. Many contrive by these long and faithful services to
amass great wealth; thus Juan Sanchez, the _Capataz_ of the late Petro
Domecq, died recently worth 300,000_l._ Towards his latter end, having
been visited by his confessor and some qualms of conscience, he
bequeathed his fortune to pious and charitable uses, but the bulk was
forthwith secured by his attorneys and priests, whose charity began at
home.
[Sidenote: BODEGAS OF XEREZ.]
As the chancellor is the keeper of the Queen’s conscience, so the
_Capataz_ is the keeper of the _bodega_ or the wine-store, which is very
peculiar, and the grand lion of Xerez. The rich and populous town, when
seen from afar, rising in its vine-clad knoll, is characterised by these
huge erections, that look like the pent-houses under which men-of-war
are built at Chatham. These temples of Bacchus resemble cathedrals in
size and loftiness, and their divisions, like Spanish chapels, bear the
names of the saints to whom they are dedicated, and few tutelar deities
have more numerous or more devout worshippers; but Romanism mixes itself
up in everything of Spain, and fixes its mark alike on salt-pans and
mine-shafts, as on boats and _bodegas_. These huge repositories are all
above ground, and are the antithesis of our under-ground cellars. The
wines of Xerez are thus found to ripen both better and quicker, as one
year in a _bodega_ inspires them with more life than do ten years of
burial. As these wines are more capricious in the development of their
character than young ladies at a boarding-school, the greatest care is
taken in the selection of eligible and healthy situations for their
education; the neighbourhood of all offensive drains or effluvia is
carefully avoided, since these nuisances are sure to affect the
delicately organised fluids, although they fail to damage the noses of
those to whose charge they are committed; and strange to say, in this
land of contradictions, Cologne itself is scarcely more renowned for its
twenty and odd bad smells ascertained by Coleridge, than is this same
tortuous, dirty, and old-fashioned Xerez. Here, as in the Rhenish city,
all the sweets are bottled up for exportation, all the stinks kept for
home consumption. The new _bodegas_ are consequently erected in the
newer portions of the town, in dry and open places; connected with them
are offices and workshops, in which everything bearing upon the wine
trade is manufactured, even to the barrels that are made of American oak
staves. The interior of the _bodega_ is kept deliciously cool; the glare
outside is carefully excluded, while a free circulation of air is
admitted; an even temperature is very essential, and one at an average
of 60 degrees is the best of all. There are more than a thousand
_bodegas_ registered at the custom house for the Xerez district; the
largest only belong to the first-rate firms, and mostly to Europeans,
that is, to English and Frenchmen. A heavy capital is required, much
patience and forethought, qualities which do not grow on these or on any
hills of Spain. This necessity will be better understood when it is
said, that some of these stores contain from one to four thousand butts,
and that few really fine sherries are sent out of them until ten or
twelve years old. Supposing, therefore, that each butt averages in value
only 25_l._, it is evident how much time and investment of wealth is
necessary.
[Sidenote: WINE-MIXING.]
Sherry wine, when mature and perfect, is made up from many butts. The
“entire,” indeed, is the result of Xerez grapes, but of many different
ages, vintages, and varieties of flavour. The contents of one barrel
serve to correct another until the proposed standard aggregate is
produced; and to such a certainty has this uniform admixture been
reduced, that houses are enabled to supply for any number of years
exactly that particular colour, flavour, body, &c., which particular
customers demand. This wine improves very much with age, gets softer and
more aromatic, and gains both body and aroma, in which its young wines
are deficient. Indeed, so great is the change in all respects, that one
scarcely can believe them ever to have been the same: the baby differs
not more from the man, nor the oak from the acorn.
That _Capataz_ has attained the object of his fondest wishes, who has
observed in his compositions the poetical principles of Horace, the
_callida junctura_, the _omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci_;
this happy and skilful junction of the sweet and solid, should unite
fulness of body, an oily, nutty flavour and _bouquet_, dryness, absence
from acidity, strength, durability, and spirituosity. Very little brandy
is necessary, as the vivifying power of the unstinted sun of Andalucia
imparts sufficient alcohol, which ranges from 20 to 23 per cent. in fine
sherries, and only reaches about 12 in clarets and champagnes. Fine pure
sherry is of a rich brown colour, but in order to flatter the
conventional tastes of some English, “pale old sherry” must be had, and
colour is chemically discharged at the expense of delicate aroma.
Another absurd deference to British prejudice, is the sending sherries
to the East Indies, because such a trip is found sometimes to benefit
the wines of Madeira. This is not only expensive but positively
injurious to the juice of Xerez, as the wine returns diminished in
quantity, turbid, sharp, and deteriorated in flavour, while from the
constant fermentation it becomes thinner in body and more spirituous.
The real secret of procuring good sherry is to pay the best price for it
at the best house, and then to keep the purchase for many years in a
good cellar before it is drunk.
[Sidenote: WINE IN CASK.]
To return to the _Capataz_. This head master passes this life of
probation in tasting. He goes the regular round of his butts,
ascertaining the qualities, merits, and demerits of each pupil, which he
notes by certain marks or hieroglyphics. He corrects faults as he goes
along, making a memorandum also of the date and remedy applied, and thus
at his next visit he is enabled to report good progress, or lament the
contrary. The new wines, after the fermentation is past, are commonly
enriched with an _arrope_, or sort of syrup, which is found very much to
encourage them. There are extensive manufactories of this cordial at
San Lucar, and wherever the _arenas_, or sandy soil, prevails. The must,
or new grape juice, before fermentation has commenced, is boiled slowly
down to the fifth of its bulk. It must simmer, and requires great care
in the skimming and not being burnt. Of this, when dissolved, the _vino
de color_, the _madre vino_, or mother wine, is made, by which the
younger ones are nourished as by mother’s milk. When old, this balsamic
ingredient becomes strong, perfumed as an essence, and very precious,
and is worth from three to five hundred guineas a butt; indeed it
scarcely ever will be sold at all. All the principal _bodegas_ have
certain huge and time-honoured casks which contain this divine ichor,
which inspires ordinary wines with generous and heroic virtues; hence
possibly their dedication of their tuns not to saints and saintesses,
but to Wellingtons and Nelsons. It is from these reservoirs that
distinguished visitors are allowed just a sip. Such a compliment was
paid to Ferdinand VII. by Pedro Domecq, and the cask to this day bears
the royal name of its assayer. Whatever quantity is taken out of one of
these for the benefit of younger wines, is replaced by a similar
quantity drawn from the next oldest cask in the cellar.
[Sidenote: TASTING WINE.]
After a year or two trial of the new wines, it is ascertained how they
will eventually turn out; if they go wrong, they are expelled from the
seminary, and shipped off to the leathern-tongued consumers of Hamburgh
or Quebec, at about 15_l._ per butt. All the various forms, stages, and
steps of education are readily explained in the great establishments,
among which the first are those of Domecq and John David Gordon, and
nothing can exceed the cordial hospitality of these princely merchants;
whoever comes provided with a letter of introduction is carried off
bodily, bags, baggage, and all, to their houses, which, considering the
iniquity of Xerezan inns, is a satisfactory move. Then and there the
guest is initiated into the secrets of trade, and is handed over to the
_Capataz_, who delivers an explanatory lecture on vinology, which is
illustrated, like those of Faraday, by experiments: tasting sherry at
Xerez has, as Señor Clemente would say, very little in common with the
commonplace customs of the London Docks. Here the swarthy professor,
dressed somewhat like Figaro in the Barber of Seville, is followed by
sundry jacketed and sandalled Ganymedes, who bear glasses on waiters;
the lecturer is armed with a long stick, to the end of which is tied a
bit of hollow cane, which he dips into each butt; the subject is begun
at the beginning, and each step in advance is explained to the listening
party with the gravity of a judicious foreman of a jury: the sample is
handed round and tasted by all, who, if they are wise, will follow the
example of their leader (on whom wine has no more effect than on a
glass), by never swallowing the sips, but only permitting the tongue to
agitate it in the mouth, until the exact flavour is mastered; every cask
is tried, from the young wine to the middle-aged, from the mature to the
golden ancient. Those who are not stupefied by the fumes, cannot fail to
come out vastly edified. The student should hold hard during the first
trials, for the best wine is reserved until the last. He ascends, if he
does not tumble off, a vinous ladder of excellence. It would be better
to reverse the order of the course, and commence with the finest sorts
while the palate is fresh and the judgment unclouded. The thirster after
knowledge must not drink too deeply now, but remember the second ordeal
to which he will afterwards be exposed at the hospitable table of the
proprietor, whose joy and pride is to produce fine wine and plenty of
it, when his friends meet around his mahogany.
What a grateful offering is then made to the jovial god, by whom the
merchant lives, and by whom the deity is now set from his glassy prison
free! What a drawing of popping corks, half consumed by time!--what a
brushing away of venerable cobwebs from flasks binned apart while George
the Third was king! The delight of the worthy Amphitryon on producing a
fresh bottle, exceeds that of a prolific mother when she blesses her
husband with a new baby. He handles the darling decanter, as if he
dearly loved the contents, which indeed are of his own making; how the
clean glasses are held up to the light to see the bright transparent
liquid sparkle and phosphoresce within; how the intelligent nose is
passed slowly over the mantling surface, redolent with fragrancy; how
the climax of rapture is reached when the god-like nectar is raised to
the blushing lips!
[Sidenote: PRICES OF SHERRY.]
The wine suffices in itself for sensual gratification and for
intellectual conversation: all the guests have an opinion; what
gentleman, indeed, cannot judge on a horse or a bottle? When
differences arise, as they will in matters of taste, and where bottles
circulate freely, the master-host _decides_--
“Tells all the names, lays down the law,
Que ça est bon; ah, goûtez ça.”
There is to him a combination of pleasure and profit in these genial
banquets, these noctes cœnæque Deum. Many a good connection is thus
formed, when an English gentleman, who now, perhaps for the first time,
tastes pure and genuine sherry. A good dinner naturally promotes good
humour with mankind in general, and with the donor in particular. A
given quantity of the present god opens both heart and purse-strings,
until the tongue on which the magic flavour lingers, murmurs gratefully
out, “Send me a butt of _amantillado pasado_, and another of _seco
reanejo_, and draw for the cash at sight.”
An important point will now arise, what is the price? That ever is the
question and the rub. Pure genuine sherry, from ten to twelve years old,
is worth from 50 to 80 guineas per butt, in the _bodega_, and when
freight, insurance, duty, and charges are added, will stand the importer
from 100 to 130 guineas in his cellar. A butt will run from 108 to 112
gallons, and the duty is 5_s._ 6_d._ per gallon. Such a butt will bottle
about 52 dozen. The reader will now appreciate the bargains of those
“pale” and “golden sherries” advertised in the English newspapers at
36_s._ the dozen, bottles included. They are _maris expers_, although
much indebted to French brandy, Sicilian Marsala, Cape wine, Devonshire
cider, and Thames water.
[Sidenote: ADULTERATION OF WINES.]
The growth of wine amounts to some 400,000 or 500,000 _arrobas_
annually. The arroba is a Moorish name, and a dry measure, although used
for liquids; it contains a quarter of a hundredweight; 30 arrobas go to
a _bota_, or butt, of which from 8000 to 10,000 of really fine are
annually exported: but the quantities of so-called sherries, “neat as
imported,” in the manufacture of which San Lucar is fully occupied, is
prodigious, and is increasing every year. To give an idea of the extent
of the growing traffic, in 1842 25,096 butts were exported from these
districts, and 29,313 in 1843; while in 1845 there were exported 18,135
butts from Xerez alone, and 14,037 from the Puerto, making the enormous
aggregate of 32,172 butts. Now as the vineyards remain precisely the
same, probably some portion of these additional barrels may not be quite
the genuine produce of the Xerez grape: in truth, the ruin of sherry
wines has commenced, from the numbers of second-rate houses that have
sprung up, which look to quantity, not quality. Many thousand butts of
bad Niebla wine are thus palmed off on the enlightened British public
after being well brandied and doctored; thus a conventional notion of
sherry is formed, to the ruin of the real thing; for even respectable
houses are forced to fabricate their wines so as to suit the depraved
taste of their consumers, as is done with pure clarets at Bordeaux,
which are charged with Hermitages and Benicarló. Thus delicate
idiosyncratic flavour is lost, while headache and dyspepsia are
imported; but there is a fashion in wines as in physicians. Formerly
Madeira was the vinous panacea, until the increased demand induced
disreputable traders to deteriorate the article, which in the reaction
became dishonoured. Then sherry was resorted to as a more honest and
wholesome beverage. Now its period of decline is hastening from the same
causes, and the average produce is becoming inferior, to end in
disrepute, and possibly in a return to the wines of Madeira, whose
makers have learnt a lesson in the stern school of adversity.
[Sidenote: MANZANILLA.]
Be that as it may, the people at large of Spain are scarcely acquainted
with the taste of sherry wine, beyond the immediate vicinity in which it
is made; and more of it is swallowed at Gibraltar at the messes, than in
either Madrid, Toledo, or Salamanca. Sherry is a foreign wine, and made
and drunk by foreigners; nor do the generality of Spaniards like its
strong flavour, and still less its high price, although some now affect
its use, because, from its great vogue in England, it argues
civilization to adopt it. This use obtains only in the capital and
richer seaports; thus at inland Granada, not 150 miles from Xerez,
sherry would hardly be to be had, were it not for the demand created by
our travelling countrymen, and even then it is sold per bottle, and as a
liqueur. At Seville, which is quite close to Xerez, in the best houses,
one glass only is handed round, just as only one glass of Greek wine was
in the house of the father of even Lucullus among the ancient Romans, or
as among the modern ones is still done with Malaga or Vino de Cypro;
this single glass is drunk as a _chasse_, and being considered to aid
digestion, is called the _golpe medico_, the coup de médecin; it is
equivalent, in that hot country, to the thimbleful of Curaçoa or Cognac,
by which coffee is wound up in colder England and France.
In Andalucia it was no less easy for the Moor to encourage the use of
water as a beverage, than to prohibit that of wine, which, if endued
with strength, which sherry is, must destroy health when taken largely
and habitually, as is occasionally found out at Gibraltar. Hence the
natives of Xerez themselves infinitely prefer a light wine called
Manzanilla, which is made near San Lucar, and is at once much weaker and
cheaper than sherry. The grape from whence it is produced grows on a
poor and sandy soil. The vintage is very early, as the fruit is gathered
before it is quite ripe. The wine is of a delicate pale straw colour,
and is extremely wholesome; it strengthens the stomach, without heating
or inebriating, like sherry. All classes are passionately fond of it,
since the want of alcohol enables them to drink more of it than of
stronger beverages, while the dry quality acts as a tonic during the
relaxing heats. It may be compared to the ancient Lesbian, which Horace
quaffed so plentifully in the cool shade, and then described as never
doing harm. The men employed in the sherry wine vaults, and who have
therefore that drink at their command, seldom touch it, but invariably,
when their work is done, go to the neighbouring shop to refresh
themselves with a glass of “innocent” Manzanilla. Among their betters,
clubs are formed solely to drink it, and with iced water and a cigar it
transports the consumer into a Moslem’s dream of paradise. It tastes
better from the cask than out of the bottle, and improves as the cask
gets low.
[Sidenote: THE ALPISTERA.]
The origin of the name has been disputed; some who prefer sound to sense
derive it from _Manzana_, an apple, which had it been cider might have
passed; others connect it with the distant town of _Mansanilla_ on the
opposite side of the river, where it is neither made nor drunk. The real
etymology is to be found in its striking resemblance to the bitter
flavour of the flowers of camomile (_manzanilla_), which are used by our
doctors to make a medicinal tea, and by those of Spain for fomentations.
This flavour in the wine is so marked as to be at first quite
disagreeable to strangers. If its eulogistic consumers are to be
believed, the wine surpasses the tea in hygæian qualities: none, say
they, who drink it are ever troubled with gravel, stone, or gout.
Certainly, it is eminently free from acidity. The very best Manzanilla
is to be had in London of Messrs. Gorman, No. 16, Mark Lane. Since
“_Drink it, ye dyspeptics_,” was enjoined last year in the ‘Handbook,’
the importation of this wine to England, which previously did not exceed
ten butts, has in twelve short months overpassed two hundred; a
compliment delicate as it is practical, which is acknowledged by the
author--a drinker thereof--with most profound gratitude.
By the way, the real thing to eat with Manzanilla is the _alpistera_.
Make it thus:--To one pound of fine flour (mind that it is dry) add half
a pound of double-refined, well-sifted, pounded white sugar, the yolks
and whites of four very fresh eggs, well beaten together; work the
mixture up into a paste; roll it out very thin; divide it into squares
about half the size of this page; cut it into strips, so that the paste
should look like a hand with fingers; then dislocate the strips, and dip
them in hot melted fine lard, until of a delicate pale brown; the more
the strips are curled up and twisted the better; the _alpistera_ should
look like bunches of ribbons; powder them over with fine white sugar.
They are then as pretty as nice. It is not easy to make them well; but
the gods grant no excellence to mortals without much labour and thought.
So Venus the goddess of grace was allied to hard-working Vulcan, who
toiled and pondered at his fire, as every cook who has an aspiring soul
has ever done.
[Sidenote: SPANISH INNS.]