During the third quarter of the eighteenth century a cloud dims the lustre of Champagne. It was then looked upon by a vast majority as only a fit accompaniment to masquerades, ridottos, ultra-fashionable dinners, and Bacchanalian suppers. 'The Champaign made some eyes sparkle that nothing else could brighten,'[335] says the contemporary account of one of those scenes of shameless revelry held under the title of masquerades at the Pantheon, and the orgies that, under the auspices of Mrs. Cornelys, disgraced Carlisle House were mainly inspired by the consumption of the same wine. The citizens of the Georgian era, who had lost the tastes of their fathers, hated French wines simply because they were French; and the hundred thousand gallons imported on an average annually from 1750 to 1786 were entirely consumed amongst the upper or the dissipated classes. Though smuggling was still looked upon as patriotic, if not loyal, those engaged in it had discovered that, thanks to the combined effects of duty and demand, Nantes brandy and Hollands gin paid better. What, indeed, is to be thought of the taste of an era that produced poets whose muse sought inspiration in punch, and who had the sublime audacity to extol the rum of the West Indies above the produce of 'Marne's flowery banks'?[336] Only a few of the higher-class men, however, engaged in literature and art seem to have retained a preference for French wine. The accounts of the Literary Club established by Sir Joshua Reynolds show the average consumption at each sitting to have been half a bottle of Port and a bottle of Claret per head. Johnson drank Port mixed with sugar from about 1752 to 1764; became a total abstainer until 1781, and then seems to have given the preference to Madeira. [Illustration: THE LITERARY CLUB.] In contemporaneous comedy we are pretty sure to find the mirror held up to fashion, if not to Nature; and turning to the playwrights of that day, it is easy to cull a few confirmatory excerpts. Thus we have Sterling, the ambitious British merchant, in order to do honour to his noble guests, preparing to 'give them such a glass of Champaign as they never drank in their lives; no, not at a duke's table.'[337] While Lord Minikin, the peer of fashion, makes his entrance on the stage, exclaiming: 'O my head! I must absolutely change my wine-merchant; I cannot taste his Champaigne without disordering myself for a week.'[338] On Miss Tittup inquiring if his depression is due to losses at cards, he replies, 'No, faith, our Champaigne was not good yesterday.'[339] Jessamy, his lordship's valet, profits of course by so aristocratic an example; and when speaking of his exploits at the masquerade, says, 'I was in tip-top spirits, and had drunk a little too freely of the Champaigne, I believe.'[340]