But it is high time to sketch, and with more elaboration than I have hitherto attempted, the claret vintage and the claret vintagers. Yet still, for a moment, I must pause upon the threshold. Will it be believed--whether it will or not it is, nevertheless, true--that the commencement of the vintage in France is settled, not by the opinion or the convenience of the proprietors, but by the _autorités_ of each _arrondissement_? As September wanes and the grape ripens, the rural mayor assembles what he calls a jury of _experts_; which jury proceed, from day to day, through the vineyards, inspecting and tasting the grapes and cross-questioning the growers; after which, they report to the mayor a special day on which, having regard to all the vineyards, they think that the vintage ought to commence. One proprietor, in a very sunny situation and a hot soil, may have been ready to begin a fortnight before; another, in a converse locality, may not be ready to commence for a fortnight afterwards. _N'importe_--the French have a great notion of uniform symmetry and symmetrical uniformity, and so the whole district starts together--the mayor issuing, _par autorité_, a highly-official-looking document, which is duly posted by yellow-breeched _gens-d'armes_, and, before the appearance of which, not a vine-grower can gather, for wine purposes, a single grape. Now, what must be the common sense of a country which permits, for one instant, the continuance of this wretched little tyrannical humbug? Only think of a trumpery little mayor and a couple of beadles proclaiming to the farmers of England that now they might begin to cut their wheat! The mayor's mace would be forced down the beadle's throat, and the beadle's staff down the mayor's. But they manage these things--not exactly--better in France. What would France be without _les autorités_? Could the sun rise without a prefect? Certainly not. Could it set without a sub-prefect? Certainly not. Could the planets shine on France unless they were furnished with passports for the firmament? Clearly not. Could the rain on France unless each drop came armed with the _visé_ of some wonderful bureau or other? Decidedly not. Well, then, how could the vintage begin until the people, who know nothing about the vintage, command it? It is quite clear, that if you have any doubt about these particulars, you know very little of the privileges, the rights, the functions, and the powers, of the "authorities" in France. [Illustration] [Illustration: THE VINTAGE.] CHAPTER III. THE VINTAGE AND THE VINTAGERS.