Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1888-07-24
ABOUT OLD WINES.
ONE OF THE DELUsIoNs OF MODERN
GASTRoNoMic ART.

Inc OlstSKeu NOS1on AuDS A80 1&nAAS.ses
Wine nIimitably-A Test Case-wines
Of the Ancients-Pompeii's Vino jar.
F1avoring and Dragging.
There Is probably no greater deiusfon In
tie modern gastronomic art than the notion
that age enriches wine limitably. II .
three or FIVE year vino Is better than the
crude juice, the process must 60 on forever.
and the wine OF 500 years must be the verita,
bic nectar of the gods. 1t is myth Of the
poets. Wine is an organic product, and to
every organic there is the immutable law Of
growth and decay, life and death There Is
no exemption Dosing with foreign sub
stance, fortification with brandies and alco-
mol, care of temperature and other devices
may stave OF the fatal decline, but for only
q little An item is going the rounds of the
press that the wines Of the late king of Bava-
ria, some Of them a century old, have been
bought by English SPECTATORS at enormous
prices to resell to English gourmets. Upon
this remarks writer in The Paris Register:
What the item says about the wines of the
excellent vintages from 1922 to 1884 is doubt
less true, and possibly it may be true Of the
Johannisberg of 1911, but I have no hesita-
ton in doubling if there is any truth or good
ness whatever in the vintages of 1910, 1910
and 1871.
THE REAL FACTS.
Now, what are the real facts about wines
as old as the abovel After fermentation,
which is a process of decay, wine will deteri-
crate unless preventive measures are taken,
such as keeping the vino in a cool or even
temperature, the addition Of alcohol, boiling
THE vinum cottum of the Romans and the
vino cotto of modern Italians) and the COM
plete exclusion Of the ordinary atmosphere
by good corks, by sealing wax or by oil The
most common method for preserving wine in
modern times is by adding alcohol and by
corking and sealing. The alcohol in wines
prepared for England is often in such pro-
portions that the wine ceases to be anything
like the juice of the grape, and too often is
as strong as glass of brandy and water.
In 1871 Mr.. Rabello, the Brazilian consul
at Oporto, made me present of several
bottles Of port wine of the vintage of 1888.
Mr.. Rabello had heard of the breaking up Of
an old Portuguese family where, from father
to son, certain number OF bottles Of famous
vintages had been handed down. I sent
several of these aged wines to the late William
Cullen Bryant, renlarking that the bottle Of
1893 was, according to the encyclopaedia,
of his own age; but the poet, in acknowledg-
ing the reception of the wine, stated that it
was his senior, and that he should look up to
it with reverence When l came to open my
bottle of 1898, I found it (which once had the
dark red Of port about the color Of water,
and the most insipid stuff. Up to the be-
ginning of this century it was not the custom
in any Part of Europe to put q lot of fiery
alcohol into any kind Of wine, and when they
did add spirit to port wine it was little of
that which had been distilled from port.
This 1893 wine had probably been thus
treated, but with all the sealing wax, and q
once good cork, the beverage was as I'M
vinous and tasteless as il It had been water
dipped up from pond and bottled. There
fore, l doubt if the Bavarian wines, so
sedulorsly advertised in England as those of
1540, 1910 and 1871 have any virtue in them,
even if they be genuine wines of those dates.
WINES OF THE ANCIENTs.
The ancients, having no distilled spirits,
were wanting in one OF the great remedies
which prevent wines from decaying. OF turn
ing to vinegar Homer represents old Mes
tor, in the Odyssey" drinking ten-year-oid
wine Atheneus incidentally mentions a
wine kept sixteen years; but, in the days of
the empire, connoisseurs considered Greei;
wine perfection when six years old. Hor-
ace tells his friends, when they come TO see
him, that he will give them ''three-year-old'
wine. But the ancients evidently did keep
wine, either by boiling, or by very tight
cori,ing and putting plaster upon the corks,
or by burying it, for twenty and thirty
years. There is one wine jar (amphora) in
the museum In stu at Pompeii, which, if the
label is to be believed, and if wine was in it
at the time Of the destruction, must have
been over forty years old in the year 70 A D.
when Pompeii was destroyed. But we must
remember that ancient wine dealers could
cook up labels, and give fictitious names,
Just as well as the modern descendants of
their craft.
As to the wines of the aucients, believe,
in general, they were, for the upper classes,
much more artificial than in this present age
Of adulteration, because it was fashion for
centuries to mix wines, and to flavor and
drug them to such an extent that we mod
erns would never drink them and would not
take them except as medicines. Not only
were spices, fragrant roots, leaves and flow-
ers stepped il the wine but myrrh, cassia,
nard and pepper were put in, and, as IL even
there were not enough, -four and grated
goats milk cheese were sprinkled over the
wine just before drinking. Home Journal
r. T. BEAN, Pres F. W. WALLER JR. Cashier.