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Old Waldorf Bar Days
WHISKEY-Less comprehensive in definition than in these
days, whiskey formerly denoted an alcoholic liquor ob–
tained by the distillation of a fermented starchy compound,
usually a grain.
Deriv.,
Gaelic,
uisgebeatha,
"water of life."
For many years an important American manufacturing
product, particularly engaging large numbers of the citizens
of Baltimore, Pittsburgh and Louisville, with Peoria, Ill.,
and other centers of culture trailing along. Varieties: rye
whiskey, made from that product; corn whiskey, called
"Bourbon" if manufactured in Kentucky, but turned out
as "White Mule" and under other names in illicit distilleries
throughout the South; "Scotch," named for the country of
its origin and popularly supposed to be made of oatmeal,
the national dish, turned into spirits by the aid of peat
fires, but more probably of barley; "Irish," made in Ireland,
but of what the encyclopedia refuses to divulge; etc. Most
names synonymous with whiskey were those of its partic–
ular manufacturers; surviving names from a pre-prohibition
past being "Haig and Haig," "Antiquary," "Perfection,"
"D
' "
"Wh.
L b l "
"J
h
W
lk "
"P .
ewar s,
1te a e,
o nny a er, etc.
n-
vate stock" meant either a brand of whiskey bottled for
some particular bar or its owner, or a bottle kept for the
use of a particular customer.
WINE-Formerly the juice of grapes, fermented by nature,
in course of time. Varieties named in the compendium in–
clude Claret, the ordinary red wine of certain districts in
France (voltage, 13.3).; Burguncl.y, the heavy red wine of
Bourgogne, 'France (voltage, 13.6); Madeira, the wine of
the Portuguese Island of that name; Port, a wine whose
name came from the Portuguese city of Oporto, whence it
was exported; Rhin$!., meaning a wine made of grapes grown
in the Rhine valley; Beaune, wines both red and white,
made in the vicinity of Beaune, France, and about the same
voltage as .Burgundy; Bordeaux, made of grapes grown in
the territory contiguous to the city of Bordeaux, France
(voltage,
11.5);
Champagne, an effervescent wine made be–
fore the war in the Marne region of France, particularly at
Rheims (voltage,
12.2).
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