On Wine* 
491 
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Combine with much carbonic acid gas ; which rhak.es it act quicker 
on the stomach, and renders it sooner intoxicating. It is a plea- 
sant wine occasionally, but meagre, and one that quickly palls up- 
on the appetite. It is far inferior to Hermitage, Burgundy, or Claret, 
and not greatly superior to good English Perry. Half Sauterne, 
and half Seltzer water, is a beverage nearly as good as Champaim 
Sauterne. A wine of delicate flavour, little if at all inferior to 
the Champagne non mousseux. Considering its quality, it is the 
cheapest of the French wines imported here; and if like all the 
rest of the French wines, it did not produce tendencies to 
gout and stone, it would be a very desirable table wine. But 
there is no French wine that is not bad for persons who have ten- 
dencies to gout. 
Chablais. Tired of Champagne and Claret, this wine of mode- 
rate flavour and moderate strength, became preferable to me a s 
a regular beverage to the others. But it has no merits that should 
induce its importation. It is superior to Fayal. 
The common Rhine wine, and Moselle wine , are little superior 
to good cyder. I have drank repeatedly Hock of 1726, and Hock of 
1749, which being kept in large quantities, had not become vine- 
■* gar : it was comparatively to the common Rhine wine, an excel- 
ent liquor. But Hock is gouty : it produces stone and gravel, it 
is perceptibly an acid wine, and fit only, to drink after rich soup 
to clear the mouth ; for which purpose only it is usaily intro- 
duced in England, in glasses fantastically imitating the course 
green tinge of the German wine-glass. Punch after strong soup 
is quite as good. Common Hock is not much better than strong 
cycler. 
Of the Italian wines, we import none, I believe except those 
of Sicily: the red wines of that country are cheap, and for their 
price very good. Certainly superior to the common clarets. So 
is Florence. The Lachryma Chrisli and Cotci-roti , we know little. 
©f here. 
Port. Vin cV Oporto. Sir Paul Methuen, and the woollen ma- 
nufacturers of Leeds and Halifax, have been the chief causes why 
Port has become the national wine of the English. It has arisen 
from the shopkeepmg notions of the British statesmen, and the 
persevering representations or rather misrepresentations of the 
manufacturing interest. To mercantile monopoly, and to manu£ : 
factoring monopoly, all the great interests of that nation have 
hitherto been made to bend. 
