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VINES AND VINEYARDS.* 



THERE is no English work on the subject of wines from which 

 any practical information can be gathered. Dr. Henderson and Mr. 

 Cyrus Redding are among the more modern authors who have offered 

 their speculations to the public on this very interesting topic ; but 

 although their works have been introduced with cost and care, we 

 question much whether, in point of actual utility, Mr. Busby's little 

 work is not more entitled to our attention than all that has been said 

 or written on the subject for many years. It is true there are no 

 ingenious theories respecting the vineyards and wines of the ancients, 

 but there is that which concerns us more closely a very interesting 

 and minute account of the culture of the grapes, and the fabrication 

 of the wines of Spain and France, which we have more to do with 

 at present than with the ancient glories of the Falernian. Future 

 ages may possibly be indebted to the ingenious speculations of their 

 Henderson or Redding as to the " whereabout" of the vineyard whence 

 we of the present day draw our Gordon sherries, or the precise hill 

 of Hermitage may be fruitful of controversy ; but, thank heaven, they 

 are not yet so mystified but that a plain straight-forward man like 

 Mr. Busby can give us all the information we desire to know, at 

 very little cost and small exertion of intellect. 



Our author is from New South Wales, and is stimulated to this 

 undertaking by the very laudable desire to improve the resources of 

 his country. With a climate and soil inferior to none, Mr. Busby 

 thinks with reason that vines may be cultivated at New South 

 Wales with such success as to form a feature in the commerce of the 

 country ; and with this object he has travelled through the principal 

 wine countries of Spain and France, visited the best cultivated 

 vineyards, obtained cuttings from almost every variety of vine, and 

 embodied the vast fund of information he has acquired as to the 

 culture of the vine and the manufacture of wine in a small work, 

 which must be invaluable to those more particularly interested, and 

 full of agreeable and useful information for the general reader. 



Mr. Busby, avoiding the prolixity of travellers regarding their 

 period of departure, and utterly eschewing all detail not immediately 

 bearing upon his grand object, skips over from London to Cadiz in 

 two lines, thus : 



" Having embarked at London on the 6th of the present month I this 

 clay landed at Cadiz. Monday, Sept. IQth, 1831." 



He then enters at once into the object of his travels, and having 

 met with a Dr. Wilson, to whom he has a letter of introduction, he 

 proceeds with him to visit Xeres, the celebrated sherry wine country. 

 On the road they taste the vin du pays, called Manzinilla, which is a 

 light, pleasant wine, having mellowness of flavour. They enter the 



* Journal of a recent Visit to the principal Vineyards of Spain and France. 

 By James Busby, Esq. Smith, Elder, and Co. 



