THE VINE IN CHAMPAGNE. 801 



could inform myself at the time, and I have really learned but little 

 new or interesting touching the matter since. However, as a greatly 

 increased interest seems to have sprung up among all classes of our 

 people within a short time past in regard to the importance and value 

 of consular reports, and as very many are now interested readers who 

 never read them before, and as the reports now called for are for the 

 special benefit of a class of interested cultivators, I have thought it 

 well for me to go back to the minutes of my study of the subject two 

 years ago and give our California friends and other vine-growers a re- 

 cast of what I then learned about the cultivation of the vine in the 

 champagne district and the manufacture of its product, together with 

 such new facts as I shall be able to give, believing that it will now come 

 under the notice of many new and appreciative readers. 



As far as the champagne country is concerned there can be no doubt 

 that the vine has been cultivated since the most remote times, the dry 

 and chalky soil of the surrounding hills and valleys being specially 

 adapted to the cultivation of the vine. The cultivation of the vine in 

 the province of Champagne, in the department of the Marne, and par- 

 ticularly in the districts of Rheims and Epernay, is, according to the 

 most reliable authorities, of very ancient date. One writer says : "Strong 

 men, we know, lived before Agamemnon, and strong wine was made in 

 the fair province of Champagne long before the days of the sagacious 

 old monk, Don Perignon, to whom the world is indebted for the spark- 

 ling vintage known under the now familiar name of champagne." Cato 

 the elder informs us that in his day vine plants were brought into Italy 

 from Gaul; and Cicero, in his speech on behalf of Fonteius, refers to the 

 great trade in wine carried on by the Gauls, of which at that time 

 Kheims was the capital. 



Domitian ordered all the vines in Champagne to be uprooted and 

 destroyed. He had an idea that the culture of the vine caused people 

 to neglect that of cereals and general agriculture, and he also feared 

 that the desire of drinking wine would attract the barbarians to the 

 country. It was not until about two centuries later (280 A. D.) that 

 they were replaced by the Emperor Probus. 



There are several groups of low hills situated on the banks of the 

 Marne and the Yesle, possessing a light, shallow soil, and with a per- 

 vious understratum principally composed of Tertiary layers and of chalk, 

 with a mixture of silica and light clay, combined with a varying pro- 

 portion of oxide of iron. These groups of hills are finely situated for 

 sunshine, and of very little good for the cultivation of other vegetable 

 produce. Such advantages as these seem to point to a special provision 

 of nature for the cultivation of the vine. Poor, sometimes even barren 

 soils, so long as they are easily accessible to air and water, are, as 

 every one here will tell you, quite sufficient for its growth. 



If the first attempts at cultivation were crowned with success, still it 

 was not till a comparatively recent date, which we may fix at the last 



