1876 Facts About Sherry by Henry Vizetelly

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Facts ahout Sherry.

such i5omps and Tanities as rinking, croquet, and kettledrums, are bent on converting the aboriginal beatben. Tbe Cassandra like warnings anent "Biscay's troubled waters" are likely to prove so many cbimeras at tbis season of tbe year, and if only tbe same delightful weather is encountered as we luckily met with during tbe latter half of our passage,"so dulcet, delicious, .and dreamy" wiU existence seem to tbe tourist, that be will quit the ship, as we left tbe "Austraba" and her courteous com mander, Captain Murray,with real regret. From Gibraltar it is ■only a few hours' sail to Cadiz, which rises inwhite-robed beauty out of tbe tm-quoise sea, while from Cadiz it is scarcely a few hours' rail to Jerez, tbe very heart of tbe sberi-y district, where from one year's end to another it is tbe habit to talk, think, and dream of little else besides wine, known in the mystical q)hraseology of the bodega as fino, palma, palo, cortado, raya, redondo, abocado, or basto. Jerez enjoys the renown of having given its name to a wine which for upwards of three centuries has been famous with Englishmen, and is more or less celebrated all over the world. From Jerez (pronounced Herez) the transition to the shenis of the oldEnglish dramatists is obvious enough, and notably to the "excellent sherris " of Shakspeare, whose panegyric of a potation which, as he puts it, diies up all the foolish, dull, and cruddy vapours environing thebrain, illumineth the face, and impels the heart to deeds of courage, will live as long as there are vineyards on the earth. The most remarkable features of the Andalusian frontier town are its vast bodegas, or wine-stoies, gilding it round like a rampart,its curious antique churches anditsMorisco alcdzar—half .palace, half fortress—the residence of its former Moorish rulers. Its peoiile are comdeous its senoritas types of southern petite grace and beauty. The town, too, has about it an unmistakable air of prosperous gentility; it is a model of cleanliness; and the dazzling whiteness of the houses, and the emerald brightness of their mouldings, rejas, andbalconies, with the cool inner courts of the handsomer dwellinp, set off with tropical plants and plashing fountains, combine, with themore or