SECRETARY'S REPORT. 347 



I should tliink, as many as a thousand more, engaged in selling 

 the same infinite variety of articles. They were sitting and 

 standing over a very large part of the street or square and 

 formed a decidedly picturesque group, some with their curious 

 costumes, some with scarcely any costume at all. 



The Hungarian gentlemen wore the dress not wholly unknown 

 in this country since the advent of Kossuth and his unfortunate 

 companions, with an abundance of lace, tight leggings, and 

 Hungarian hat. Most of them understand and talk German, 

 many of them well, but the majority of the people if they talk 

 it at all, speak it with a very marked provincialism. 



The grapes I found in Hungary were by far the best and 

 most delicious, and the cheapest, of any in Europe. Possibly 

 it was owing, in part, to the fact that, it being later in the season, 

 they were riper, but probably the soil and the hot season had 

 much to do with it. In Switzerland there had been frequent 

 rains, and so in most other parts of Europe, and this has au 

 injurious effect on the flavor of the grape and of the wine made 

 from it. In a wet season there will generally be a greater 

 abundance, but an inferior quality, of wine ; and this accounts 

 for the fact that the vintage of some particular years is so much 

 more celebrated than that of others. But to whatever cause it 

 was due, whether to soil, season or variety, the grape was the 

 finest and the most melting I ever tasted. Very large and 

 splendid clusters could be bought anywhere for three or four 

 kreutzers, or two or three cents. 



With such grapes common everywhere in Hungary, cultivated 

 as they are by every peasant, it is not surprising that the wines 

 of the country should be so popular. Of the thirty or forty 

 varieties made here, the Tokay is probably the most widely 

 known. It is, like most of the wines of the country, the pure 

 juice of the grape, the practice of adding alcohol, common in 

 other parts of Europe, not being followed here. The grapes 

 from which the Tokay is made are allowed to get dead ripe on 

 the vine, when they are picked and put over a large strainer, to 

 press out their own juice. This forms the extract of Tokay ^ a 

 thick, sweet wine, said by some to be the most perfect wine in 

 tlje world. After this extract, old wine is poured upon the pulp, 

 and a second sweet wine is produced. Hungary was celebrated 

 for its wines more than two thousand years ago. 



