The times., 1899-12-03
Attractions of the Place

with greatest skill and care past innumer-
! able reefs shadows and rapids, down TO
the Oporto storehouses.
Attractions of the Place.
Senior Ferreira and his charming wife and
daughters were urelesz in their gracious
courtesies, showing US every detail of wine
| making to its final curing in vast cellars
| tunneled into the solid rock To further
/ exemplify rural life in Portugal, they gave
ball in our honor in the great presshOuse,
| its wooden pillars hidden by living vines
covered with punches of luscious grapes, cut
from the vineyard for the occasion The
peasants, IN their gypsy-like costumes in all
the colors of Josephs coat-the men with
short velvet trousers and jackets, white
blouses, fringed sashes, and golden hoops
in their ears; the women wonderfully be-
dizened with futtsring ribbons and bits OF
tinsel, hligree necklaces, bracelets, crowns,
/ and brooches, the work OF the world-famed
goldsmiths OF Oporto; the strange dancing
half danza, half fandango, and the music
Of the local orchestra, guitar and mandolin,
mingled with the sharp click of castanets,
the rasping OF gourd fiddles, and the rattle
Of table forks shaken in glass bottles-are
things TO be long remembered. And then
the wines-old white and amber-hued ports,
/ distilled more Than half q century ago, not
10 be rashly lmbibed but every drop more
precious than gold 10 sight and smell
In the manufacture of port there are
/ no secrets, and no reserve IN the whole
/ process of yinifcauon, all the world be
/ ing welcome TO witness every smallest
! detail, which seems to show that there is
I no crookedness to be concealed. 1t has
I been falsely asserted that Oporto wine Is
a tod Of Cd fozr
] erages; but the truth is that he who drinks
a glass Of il, drinks as nearly natural and
! pure q form OF concentrated grape juice
as it is possible to produce. If ever adul-
/ terated at ALL il has been merely to sat
+ isfy public taste, at greater expense and
/ trouble TO the makers than unmiXed grape
juice. For example, in England, where
! these wines find by far their greatest mar
I ket the popular fancy some years ago
ran to almost black, very strong and fruity
port, and then to satisfy the demand the
/ makers employed elderbeTTies to daTken it.
When the light wine people heard of it,
/ they pretended to be terribly shocked, pos
/ sibly to cover some croOkedness of their
/ own, and raised no end OF hue and cry
about "adulteration." forgetting tnat one
! fruit is really as wholesome as the other.
! As for logwood adulteration, that fable has
always been ibelous. Any chemist will
wood makes il absolutely imperative as a
! dye In any sort Of wine.
Indeed, so long as the public has the
! good sense 70 be satisfied with the true
! garnet-red color Of pure port" which
/ turns with age TO rich amber, no merchant
viii be so eXtravagant as to put elderber-
! ries in it-a much scarcer and therefore
! dearer fruit than grapes in Portugal. II
/ eXacling customers desire their wine 10
/ resemble ink there j. much cheaper dye
+ than even logwood, and one always at hand
I In POrtugal-the darker varieties Of native
/ grapes in their natural colors. So the
point is clear that as there is nothing so
cheap and convenient with which to adul
| terate port wine as itself, it is bound to be
pure as the Yankee cider, for which the
! farmer carries his own apples to the mill
and watches the process Of their crushing,
worms and all.
The True Port District.
! The true port" wine is made only in one
/ corner of Portugal, in a district marked out
I especially by nature to be one huge vine
yard 1t is cut off from the sea by one
( lofty range Of mountains and sheltered by
others from the north and east winds
Even the valley Of vineyards is hilIy and
precipitous, the vines growing on barren
I looking soil, q peculiar brown, crumblng,
slaty schist, built up into multitudinous
/ terraces from top to bottom of the hills.