by promote gayety, and chase anxiety and care; warm the heart, and at the same time stimulate the flow of ideas, whence will come sociability, and with sociability, politeness and toleration, elegance and good taste. It will prevent and cure dyspepsy, the most American and the least French of all diseases that scourge the world-in fine, by virtue of its tonic and stimulating properties, touch every weakness for which.tonics and stimulants are prescribed -not, however, as a medicine, to lose its power with use, or be followed by reaction, but as a continuing condition-a habitual alimentation, like pure air, nourishing food, exercise, and proper clothing.

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CHAPTER VIII.

EPERNAY.

TURNED aside from my intended visit to Champagne on learning vintage was. ended in that province, and went on to Paris. Two months later I ran over to Epernay, one of the chief seats of the commerce in sparkling wines, and presented myself to my old correspondent, M. Girbal, who received me like a brother, and very soon put me in the way of seeing all worth seeing in the neighborhood. There are two cities at Epernay-one above ground, of buildings two and three stories high, and another under ground, of cellars two and three stories deep. This last, however, is not, like the Catacombs beneath Paris, a city of the dead, a receptacle of skulls and cross-bones, but a store-house of well-corked and wired bottles, full of pent-up life and sparkle, laughter and noise. The caves I visited, and which took the whole day to explore, were those of Moet and Chandon, Piper and Co., Ruinart, and Roussillon. The first of these I found the most extensive, and the

last the most interesting; for these M. Roussillon himself showed me through, and voluntarily gave such full and frank explanations as stripped of nearly all its mystery an art whose few professors in America seem to keep it as close a secret as if it were alchemy.

Very little masonry is seen in the cellars of Champagne. Except an occasional patch of brick or stone to fill up a fault in the natural formation, all was hewn out of the solid chalk. Easily cut as this is, it is nevertheless abundantly strong, and durable as rock, while its chemical quality seems to render the atmosphere of its chambers singularly pure and dry. A two-story cellar is common, and some are even three deep. Mad. Pommery, of Rheims, is making one, I am told, of which the floor of the upper story will be eighty feet below the surface of the ground. Were it not for the ease with which Champagne bottlers can burrow in the earth, their wine could not be afforded so cheap as it is. To construct of stone or brick caves as vast as those, for instance, of Moet and Chandon, would require so great a fortune that upon the interest of it both Moet and Chandon might live like princes.

The wine grown in Champagne is a natural sparkler. With Catawba, Burgundy, Hock, and all other sparkling wines known to commerce, the fermenta

tion which ensues immediately on the first bottling having done its work in developing the gas and depositing a sediment subsides, and is never heard from again; but with true Champagne new fermentations repeatedly occur, each one depositing its sediment, to be got rid of by a fresh tabling and shaking. For instance, M. Roussillon showed me a stack of fine Still Sillery bottled, not to sparkle, but to keep quiet, and therefore without any addition of sugar, yet it had fretted and fumed within the glass during six or seven years before it would be Still Sillery. Two and often three disgorgings and recorkings are needed before it is safe to send out for sale. By reason of this foamy quality it is that makers of Sparkling in other parts of France often use a certain portion of wine grown in Champagne to mix with that of their own districts. I am inclined to think, from my experiments with it, that the Scuppernong, produced in North Carolina, is as good a natural sparkler as we need.

Usually at least three qualities, growths of different places in the province, are mixed together, which is done toward the end of December following vintage; but the finer kinds are never mixed. And my entertainer, M. Girbal, out of consideration for his health, puts up what he needs for table use wholly unmixed, although not using, he said, raw wine of

very high quality. I can say for it, however, that it was good, and had a fresh and free taste, more like Sparkling Catawba than any Champagne I had drunk.

They make four kinds of Sparkling-high sparkling, common sparkling, half sparkling, or crémant, and tisane. The half sparkling is best, and the tisane the most inferior. But better than all, and the true type of Champagne, is that which does not sparkle at all, being entirely free of sugar or other admixture, and bottled when new merely in order that while ripening it may keep its fresh and delicate flavor. And this is the original of bottled Champagne. The plan of forcing a sparkling fermentation only gradually grew out of the ancient practice, which did not aim at producing foam and noise, but only at preserving purity, delicacy, and grape-blossom bouquet, that they might become united to maturity and fineness, like a wedding of youth, innocence, and beauty with experience and wisdom. Of such is Still Sillery, and I can testify that some M. Roussillon gave me was delicacy itself and purity itself.

For Sparkling wine an early vintage is considered important. The fruit is put to press soon as may be after being gathered, with no crushing whatever, and in as solid a condition as the necessary handling and transportation will permit. The juice reposes in large