154 GRAPE CULTURE AND WTNE-MAKING. 



twcnty-five departments produce only common wines unfit for 

 exportation). Every wine lias its name, derived from a town, a 

 county, a mountain, or a lake. Some large districts are celebrated 

 for their wines ; but even in small and less-known localities ex- 

 cellent wines are to be found, concealed like treasures wliick only 

 wait to be discovered. The most renowned wines are : 



LIQUEUK WINES 



White. 

 Tokay. Soprony. 



Baszt. Szent Gyocrgy. 



Red. 



Menes. Villkny. 



Eger. Kkrloviez. 



TABLE WINES, 



£rmellek. Menes. Szerednye. Villany. 



Bakator. Eger. Neszmely. Visonta. 



Somlyd. Szegszard. Kcebanya. Karlo\'iez. 



Balaton. Badacsony. Borsod, etc. Nograd, etc. 



Buda. Magyarlit. 



"Numberless are the varieties of wines, for they vary in every 

 respect : in color, from dark to pale red, from green to golden-yel- 

 low ; in strength, they are light or strong ; in taste, dry or sweet, 

 with more or less flavor. It may be that one or another may not 

 suit one's taste, but it is impossible that every body should not 

 find among these different wines one agreeable to him. What is 

 necessary is to try all, and afterward choose the most suitable. 



"2. The Hungarian wines are generally stronger than the 

 French or the Khine wines. The reason of this may be sought 

 in the kind of grape, in the properties of the soil, in the peculiar 

 climate of the country, and finally, I think, in the fact that in Hun- 

 gary the vineyards are commonly situated upon elevated hills, I 

 dare even call them mountains. The Hungarians, knowing the 

 old Latin proverb, Bacchus colles amat (" Bacchus loves the hills"), 

 have followed the advice ; they even now laugh at and despise 

 the wines growing in the low plains, which is the case with most 

 French wines. 



" And this is not all. Two contrary tendencies are very per- 

 ceptible in the two countries. The demand for French wines be- 

 ing great, the French cultivators, for thirty or forty years past, 

 have left the finest wines out of account ; they prefer the inferior 

 sorts at a low price to the finer at a high price ; they plant the 

 vines close together, thus depriving the fruit of sun and air ; they 

 choose a rich soil, which gives a more abundant but an inferior 

 produce ; they, with the same object in view, make too much use 

 of manure, which injures the quality of the wine (a practice once 

 forbidden by laiv) ; in a word, the French wine has lost in flavor 

 what it has gained in fecundity ; quality has been sacrificed to 

 the quantity. 



" But in Hungary the contrary still prevails — that old system 

 under which the quality is the principal object in view, under 

 which a favorable exposure is tue all-important consideration; 



