“Firm and erect the Caledonian stood, Prime was his mutton, and his claret good: Let him drink port, an English Statesman cried; He drank the poison, and his spirit died.” The white wines of these districts are delicious, and are not sufficiently appreciated in England, where we know very little of the Sauternes, Bommes, Barsac, Fargues, St. Pierre de Mons, Preignac, and those of Petits Graves and the Côtes. Chief of all is the wine of Château d’Yquem, of which Vizitelly[26] thus writes:— “Among the white wines of the Gironde which obtained the higher class reward, two require to be especially mentioned. One, the renowned Château d’Yquem of the Marquis de Lur Saluces, the most luscious and delicately aromatic of wines, which, for its resplendent colour, resembling liquid gold, its exquisite bouquet, and rich, delicious flavour, due, according to the chemists, to the presence of Mannite, is regarded in France as unique, and which, at Vienna, naturally met with the recognition of a medal for progress. “Mannite, the distinguished French chemist Berthelot informs us, has the peculiar quality of not becoming transformed into alcohol and carbonic acid during the process of fermentation. For a tonneau of this splendid wine twelve years old, bought direct from the Château, the Grand Duke Constantine paid, some few years since, 20,000 francs, or £800. The other wine calling for notice was La Tour Blance, one of those magnificent, liqueur-like Sauternes, ranking immediately after Château d’Yquem, and to some fine samples of which, of the vintages of 1864 and 1865, a medal for merit was awarded. [Illustration: THE DILETTANTE SOCIETY. In this illustration of “the Dilettante Society” we find that Noblemen and Gentlemen such as Lord Mulgrave, Lord Seaforth, Hon. Chas. Greville, Charles Crowle, and the Duke of Leeds, drank their claret out of the black bottle—dispensing with the decanter altogether.] “The characteristic qualities of Château d’Yquem, which certain _soi-disant_ connoisseurs pretend to pooh-pooh, as a mere ordinary _vin de liqueur_, are due, in no degree, to simple accident. On the contrary, the vintaging of this wine is an extremely complicated and delicate affair. In order to insure the excessive softness and rich liqueur character which are its distinguishing qualities, the grapes, naturally excessively sweet and juicy, are allowed to dry on their stalks, preserved, as it were, by the rays of the sun, until they become covered with a kind of down, which gives to them an almost mouldy appearance. During this period, the fruit, under the influence of the sun, ferments within its skin, thereby attaining the requisite degree of ripeness, akin to rottenness.