DIVISION THE FOURTH. "The art of extracting alcoholic liquors by distillation, must be regarded as the greatest crime ever inflicted on human nature." DR. PARIS. Fabricius relates the following rabbinical tradition in relation to the effects of wine:-When Noah planted the vine, Satan attended on the occasion, and sacrificed a sheep, a lion, an ape, and a sow. These animals were intended to be symbolical of the gradations of drunkenness. When a man begins to drink he is meek and ignorant as a lamb; then he becomes bold as a lion; his courage afterwards is transformed into the foolishness of the ape; and at last he wallows in the mire like a sow.* Plutarch informs us that, previous to the time of Psammeticus, the Egytians neither drank wine nor used it in their offerings. They deemed it odious to the gods, and the blood of those who had contended with I. The history of intoxicating wines. II. Intoxi- them in war, that is, of the giants, and in cating liquors made from various kinds of grain, particular of the evil deity Typhon and his fruits, and other substances. III. The history of distilled liquors. adherents. The tradition further states, that the vine sprang up from the slain whose I. The history of intoxicating wines. The bodies had mingled with corruption. Hence produce of the vineyard formed no slight the reason, says the same writer, why wine proportion of the food of the early inhabi- makes those who drink it furious and frantants of the earth. The culture of the vine, tic.† therefore, was an object of interest and value. A knowledge of intoxicating wine probably was coeval with the culture of the vine and the preservation of its juice or fruit. Noah was rendered drunk by the produce of his own vineyard. This tradition most probably had its origin in the policy, moral as well as political, of the early legislators of Egypt. The Persians relate the following anecdote in reference to the invention of wine; It is extracted from Moullah Ackbers M.SS.; Inebriating wine has ever been one of and is quoted by Sir James Malcolm, in his the most fruitful instruments of the Prince History of Persia. Jem Sheed, the founder of Darkness. Nations, and tribes, and sects, of Persepolis, was immoderately fond of have, in various ages of the world, viewed grapes, and, with the view to preserve some, it with disgust and abhorrence, and, in ac-placed them in vessels which were lodged cordance with this feeling, prohibited its in vaults for future use. When the vessels manufacture and use. Some striking ex-were opened it was found that the grapes amples of this kind are narrated in another (or rather the liquor which had issued from division of this volume. them) had fermented. The juice in this The rabbins, or learned Jewish doctors, state was so acid that the king believed it were of opinion that the forbidden fruit, of to be poisonous. A label, with the word which our first parents partook, was the "poison," was accordingly placed upon each produce of the vine. Lightfoot, and other of the vessels. One of the favourite ladies of eminent theologians of modern times, en- the court was afflicted with most distressing tertained a similar belief. This tradition, attacks of nervous headache, in a paroxysm doubtless, had its origin in the seductive and injurious influence of wine. Milton seems to suppose that the fruit, "whose mortal taste Brought death into the world, and all our woe," possessed inebriating qualities. The pas- "Soon as the force of that fallacious fruit, of which she resolved to put an end to her existence. By accident she found one of the vessels with the word "poison" written on it, and, intent on her purpose, swallowed its contents. Stupefaction, as might be expected, followed this act, and strange to say, unlike similar indulgence in modern times, her headache was gone. Charmed * Warton's Dissertation on the Gesta Romanorum. † De Oside et Osiride, sec. 6. with the remedy, the lady was induced devil; and that drinking and using it was often to repeat the experiment, until the wicked and sinful.* monarch's poison was all drunk. The theft The same divine also remarks of the was soon discovered, and the fair culprit Severians, that áñεxovтaι OLvov TaνTEλÕS, confessed the deed. A quantity of wine "they abstained altogether from wine." t was again made, and Jem Sheed and all Severus flourished in the time of Pope his court partook of the newly-discovered Sotherus. His disciples condemned wine beverage. This circumstance gave rise to as a creature of Satan.‡ Epiphanius tells a name by which inebriating wine is known us, that they believed it to be engendered in Persia in the present day-Zeher-e- by serpents. Hence the reason why wine Koos-hon-" the delightful poison."* is so strong. Photius de Agapio, concern The Manichæans attributed the inven- ing the same sect, observes, that, Tov oivov, tion of wine to the devil. St. Augustin οία διη μεθυστικόν, αποστρέφονται, “they blames them for their peverseness, inasmuch were averse to wine as the cause of drunkas they refused to take wine, while they enness."§ The Essenians were accustomed did not scruple to eat grapes.† St. Au- to term wine "fool's physic." gustin appears to have entertained a notion St. Basil the Great, bishop of Cæsarea, which even in our own days is not without its in Cappadocia, in his first canonical letter advocates, that fermented wine is a "good to Amphilocius, bishop of Iconium, written creature of God," and, therefore, to be re- A.D. 370, says, in reference to the Marcioceived with thanksgiving. The distinction nists, AπоотρέOоνтαι TÓν olvov, "they between wine and must, (or, in other words, are averse to wine." This sect asserted unfermented wine,) as Michaelis observes, is that wine was defiled, and not a creature of a luminous one," and all persons must God. admit that, in a moral as well as physical The Koran of Mahomet makes a wise point of view, a considerable difference exists distinction between the refreshing and between cooling and nutritious fruits and nutritious juice of the grape and intoxicatstimulating and inebriating wine. This ing wine. "Of the fruit of the grape," says erroneous notion appears to have been pre- the prophet, 'ye obtain an inebriating valent among those Christians of the few liquor, and also good nourishment. The first centuries, who were converts from dread which the Mahommedans entertained, among the Gentiles, and whose habits and in days of yore, in relation to inebriating notions, in many respects, differed from the wine, gave rise to an adage well known Jews. Severe enactments are found in those among the Turks, "There lurks a devil in canons which are denominated apostolical, every berry of the vine." In allusion to in relation to officers of the church, who this proverb, one of our poets remarks in abstained from marriage, and flesh, and wine, similar language, “The berries of the grape out of abhorrence, and not for mortification; with furies swell." thus casting reproach, as the canons allege, The Arabians designate inebriating wine on the workmanship of God.§ The sects, as "the mother of evils;" an appellation however, on whom this censure fell, enter- singularly appropriate and expressive. The tained heterodox opinions on matters of records of history teem with melancholy faith. No analogy, therefore, exists between examples of its direful effects. Golu, in his these parties and persons holding similar Arabic Lexicon, introduces the word vinum views, in reference to wine, in the present (wine) and the phrase mater malorum in day. that language as synonimous in meaning.** Theodoret remarks of Tatian, one of the Our knowledge of the mode in which the Greek fathers, who flourished A. D. 172, ancients prepared their inebriating wines is την ουτε οἶνου μεταληψιν βδελυττεται, “he limited and obscure. Certain of these wines, abhors the use of wine."* Tatian conse-doubtless, were rendered more or less incrated bread and water alone for the Eu-toxicating by fermentation; others were charist. rendered potent by the aid of inebriating The Hydroparastate and Encratites en- drugs. A third and numerous class, on tertained similar notions. St. Epiphanius, the other hand, in particular at a more rebishop of Salamis, in reference to the En-mote period, were prepared in such a mancratites, says: Oivov öλws ov μɛтaλaμßá-ner as to render the presence of alcohol, at νουσι, φασκοντες εἶναι διαβολικόν και τους least to an extent capable of producing πὶνὸντας καὶ τοὺς χρωμένους, ἀνόμους intoxication, an utter impossibility. The εivaι Kai àμaρradas, "they did not use latter class of wines will receive due consiwine at all, saying, that it was from the deration in subsequent sections. Malcolm's History of Persia, vol. i., p. 16. Quæ tanta perversio est, vinum putare, Fel principis tenebrarum et uvis comedendis non parcere. Augustin de Morib. Manichæor, lib. ii., sec. 44, tom. ii., p. 752, ed. Bened. Michaelis Comment. on the Law of Moses, vol. 3, p. 131-2. § Apostolical Canons, 43-45. Theodoret. hæret. fab., lib. i., cap. 20. p. 208. The productions of Pliny, Palladius,Cato, and Columella among the Romans, of Athe-by some writers under the same denominanæus and the Geoponic writers among the tion. The wines produced from all these Greeks, and the scattered and often vague hills were usually classed under the general allusions of the poets and other writers of appellation of Massic or Falernian. ancient times, form the chief sources from whence we alone can acquire information on this interesting subject. Even these writers leave many important details in unfortunate obscurity. The culture of the vine descended from the Egyptians to the Asiatics and Greeks. The latter people acquired great celebrity in the manufacture of their wines. Camillus Perigrinus, in his elaborate dissertations on this subject, shows that Massic and Falernian were synonimous terms, and were applied to the same kind of wine.* Columella, by the term Massic, includes all the wines of the Ager Falernus. enumeration of the most valued wines of Italy, he makes mention only of the Massicum Surrentinum, the Albanium, and the In his The Italians at a later period carried this Cæcubum. art to high perfection. The soil of Italy! The qualities of these wines perhaps difwas peculiarly favourable to the culture offered more than their names. Pliny dithe vine. Italy, indeed, became known vides them into three kinds. The first class among nations as Oenotria, the country of he describes as rough and harsh, the second wines. The inhabitants of Italy were de- as sweet and pleasant, and the third as light nominated Oenotrii viri, the cultivators of and weak. It is a difficult matter to deterwines. Hence Virgil, "Oenotrii coluere viri." Innumerable varieties of grapes were pro- "Non eadem arboribus pendet vindemia nostris Sunt et Amine vites firmissima vina The same distinguished poet informs us that we may with as much ease attempt to enumerate the sands on the Lybian coast, as to specify the various species of wines then made. mine to which kind many of the heathen writers refer in their various productions. The Faustian wine would appear to have been very strong. Pliny remarks that solo vinorum flamma accenditur, it was the only wine which would kindle on contact with a flame. The Falernian wine, strictly so called, evidently did not belong to the class of thick or nutritious wines.† Galen, in his book, De Cibo, leads us to infer that some wines of this class were moderately sweet, a condition which is not incompatible with a certain degree of alcoholic strength. He remarks, that of the yellow and ruddy wines, some were moderately sweet; as for example, the Hippodomantian, Faustian, and Falernian. Other wines, he further observes, were entirely devoid of sweetness. Ruellius affirms, that all the Falernian wines were amber in colour. This fact accounts for their want of sweetness. All the very sweet or red, the colour of the juice from which and unintoxicating wines were either black they were made. No white or very thin wines, as Galen informs us, were sweet.One species of Falernian wine possessed a very agreeable odour, a property which it probably derived from the common practice in those days of blending their wines with aromatic perfumes. Martial compares the scent emitted from a cask of this wine, when opened, to the sweet breath of Diadumona. The Campania Felix, a name given to that portion of Italy which borders on the Mediterranean, because of the excellence of its soil, was peculiarly distinguished for its growth of vines. L. Florus eulogises this During the infancy of the Roman state, fertile tract of land in encomiastic terms.* wine was rarely used, except on sacrificial Pliny also speaks in warm language of the occasions. In the time of Homer, the vine reputation of its wines. The Åger Falernus grew wild in Sicily and the neighbouring is in particular specified by this writer. The shores. In a thousand years afterwards, highest portion of this tract, afterwards the Italians could boast that there were at known by the name of Massicus, was at one least fourscore various kinds of wine then in period denominated the Gaurus. The mid-use, more than two-thirds of which were dle portion was named the Faustianus, and produced in their own country. This numthe Falernian, strictly so called, occupied the ber, however, included those only which were lowest portion of all. The Calenus Formia, held in most esteem. Pliny informs us, that as well as its contiguous hills, are included L. Florus, lib. i., cap. 16. * Dissert. 2, de Campania Fælici Thesaur. Antiq. Rom., tom. ix., pars. 2. Galen, De Atten. Diæt. Comment., lib. i., § 5. the luxurious Romans had no less than 195 remarks, in reference to those prepared in general varieties of wines in use, but that Italy in his day, that they differed altogether a subdivision of their species would amount from ancient wines, both in their preparato twice as many more.* It would be im- tion and quality; nam nostra dulcia, et alba, possible in the present treatise to enumerate ut etiam nigra inebriant, "for our sweet wines, the names of these different wines. Pliny and white, as also black wines, intoxicate." and other writers dwell largely on their This decisive passage is introduced in the titles, and the districts in which they were present place to warn the reader not to produced. The writings of the poets, also, confound the sweet wines of the ancients contain scattered allusions to the wines held with those of comparatively modern times. in most esteem. The latter sources of in- It will, hereafter, be shown, that they formation, however, afford meagre details differed, in many respects, both in their in reference to the nature and qualities of mode of preparation and qualities. those wines, which form the subjects of their glowing effusions. Father Stephen Lusignan observes of the Cyprus wines of his day, that they were so The renowned wines of Homer occupy, strong that they would kindle in the fire and perhaps, the most prominent place in the burn like oil. Chaucer thus alludes to the writings of the ancients. The wines of the strength of the white wine of Lepe (Niebla, Opimian vintage among the Italians acquired near Seville), in Spain, Now kepe you fro the white and fro the rede, equal celebrity. Greece and the islands of the Archipelago had their Pramnian, Phanæan, Lesbian, Chian, Rhodian, Coan, and numerous other wines. The Tmolus of Lydia, the Mareotic and Tæniotic of Egypt, the Byblos of Phænicia, the Mendæan of Thrace, and the Lebanon and Helbon of Palestine, were each celebrated for some peculiar excellence of flavour. It is certain, however, that many of these wines differed in several respects from the wines of modern Early attempts were made by the Romanufacture. Those of Asia and Greece, mans to introduce the growth of the vine in particular, or at least a great proportion into the British empire. Wine, according of them, were thick, rich, nutritious and un- to Speed, was manufactured in almost every intoxicating wines. monastery. The Isle of Ely, in particular, In order to arrive at a correct knowledge became so celebrated for the fruitfulness of its of the habits and practices of the ancients in vintage, as to be called the "Isle of Vines,” reference to wine, several important particu- and the bishop, soon after the conquest, lars must be kept in view. The wines of exacted tithes from the vineyards. The the Greeks and Asiatics differed in many vine, however, has never been cultivated in respects from those of the Romans. Even this country to any great extent. the Italians themselves were almost as di- French conquests, indeed, placed within our versified in their tastes as the revolving years. reach wines of a superior quality. The favourite wine of one period was at no distant date displaced by some new invention of luxury. Pliny assures us, that the grapes called Thasiæ, Mareotides, and Lage, so lauded by Virgil, were not to be found in his time in any part of Italy.† The Cæcuban wine, in its day, was held in great esteem; but when Pliny wrote his celebrated work, it was entirely lost. These observations hold good also in relation to the nature of ancient wines. Tastes degenerated as well as wines; and the simple, unintoxicating wines, which satisfied the demands of primitive ages, were rejected for the costly and period, was almost universal. Wines were drugged liquors of more modern invention. so abundant in this country in the fourteenth This subject will receive more ample consi- century, that when King Richard II., after deration in succeeding sections. a long absence, was greeted by the inhabi Our The wines chiefly drank in the fourteenth century are thus enumerated by a poet of that period : Ye shall have rumney and malespine, Warton's Hist. Poet., vol. i., p. 177. The taste for sweet wines, even at this In later centuries, the mode of preparing tants of London, the very conduits in the unintoxicating wines was almost entirely streets through which the procession passed lost. Andreas Baccius, a learned writer of were allowed to run with every variety of the sixteenth century, who made the history liquor. In the same century the quantity of wine a subject of elaborate investigation, of wine entered in the household expenses of Thomas Earl of Lancaster, as consumed "Grand Canary Island," in which our during one year, was not less than 371 ancestors indulged with no sparing hand. pipes. It is a fact, moreover, that more port wine In the reign of Edward IV., A. D. 1470, is consumed in Britain than in all the at the installation feast of the Archbishop world besides. Such also is the nefarious of York, one hundred tuns of wine, and practice of modern wine merchants, that, three hundred tuns of ale, making a total probably, in England, as in the United of more than 100,000 quarts of intoxicating States, the consumption of (so called) port liquor, were provided for the entertainment. wine exceeds the whole annual produce of It is proper, however, to state, that these the Alto Douro. Our progenitors, it seems, beverages were not of the same alcoholic were liable to similar imposition. Howell strength as the wines and ales in use in the says, "I think there is a hundred times present day. more drank under the name of Canary The price of wine was in proportion to wine than there is brought in, for Sherries its abundance. Rochelle, or Poictu wine, and Malagas well mingled pass for Canaries A. D. 1199, was sold for twenty shillings the in most taverns, more often than canary tun, or fourpence for the gallon. Wine of itself, else I do not see how 'twere possible Anjou was sold for twenty-four shillings the for the vintner to save by it, or to live by tun, or sixpence the gallon. No other his calling, unless he were permitted someFrench wines were allowed to be vended times to be a brewer. When sacks and for more than twenty-five shillings the canaries were brought in first among us, tun, a price, however, which was soon in- they were used to be drunk in aqua vitæ creased to sixpence and eightpence the measures, and 'twas held fit only for those gallon. Need we wonder that the historian to drink of them who used to carry their observes, as a consequence of this state of legs in their hands, their eyes upon their noses, things, that the land was filled with drink and an almanack in their bones, but now and drunkards? In the thirteenth century they go down every one's throat, both the best wine could be procured at the rate young and old, like milk."* Howell eviof forty shillings for thirty-six gallons, and dently alludes to the aged and infirm, who sometimes even for less. were necessitated to use crutches wherewith It would not be within the limits of this to walk, spectacles to strengthen their sight, essay to enumerate the great variety of and whose infirm bodies were affected by wines used in the present day, as well as every change of season. This ingenious and their modes of preparation and their peculiar learned writer details many more curious properties. A remark which Howell, made particulars in reference to inebriating A. D. 1634, will apply with equal appro- drinks. priateness to the wine districts of the nine II.-Intoxicating liquors made from teenth century. "As in Spain, so in all various kinds of grain, fruits, and other subother wine countries, one cannot pass a stances.-The art of producing intoxicating day's journey but he will find a differing liquors from various kinds of grain and race of wines."t fruits, had its origin at a remote period. At that period the same writer states, that Some writers attribute this invention to "Portugal afforded no wines worth trans- those tribes or nations whose poverty did porting." The wines of Portugal now form not allow them to indulge in the use of a staple article of consumption. Of Canary wine. Seneca, in reference to this subject, wines, Howell speaks in warm terms. says, quædam gentes beneficio paupertatis "French wines," he remarks, " may be luxuriam non movere, "that certain nations said but to pickle meat in the stomach, but were not able to indulge in the luxury bethis is the wine that digests, and doth not cause of their poverty." A more numeronly breed good blood, but it nutrifieth it ous class of writers attribute the invention also, being a glutinous substantial liquor." to the inhabitants of those districts in In his quaint, but pointed phraseology, which, from the poverty of the soil or other Howell tells us, "that of this wine, if of any causes, the vine was not grown. Julian, other, may be verified that merry induction, the apostate, in his epigrams, says of the that good wine maketh good blood, good Gauls and Celts, that they were not able to blood causeth good humours, good humours drink wine, rỹ tεviy ßorpúŵv, because of cause good thoughts, good thoughts bring the want of vines. Diodorus affirms the forth good works, good works carry a same thing, σTECLOкouέvous oïvov.‡ Isiman to heaven, ergo, good wine carrieth a dorus, in reference to the people of Spain, man to heaven. If this be true," adds states, that in his time they made liquors Howell," surely more English go to heaven from fruits or grain, quod ferax vini locus this way than any other, for I think there's non esset, "because the country was not more canary brought into England than fruitful of wine."§ Strabo also informs us, to all the world besides." The wines of Portugal now supersede those from the * Anderson's Hist. of Commerce, An. 1313. † Familiar Letters, letter lv. * Ibid., letter lv. † Seneca, lib. iii., de Ira. Lib. v., chap. 26. Isid. Orig., lib. xx., cap. 3. |