We were quite certain we should not like to taste it; but there in front of us was held the tumbler, with behind it a pair of politely observant black eyes, and an unbroken flow of commendation in sing-song Bordelais French. We were assured that the _moût_ was delicious, mild, and sweet, that the vintagers drank it every day by the gallon, and, lastly, that it was very wholesome; and we replied with a ghastly smile that we were not concerned about its wholesomeness, we did not contemplate a surfeit just at first; while all the time we heard the splashing of the feet in the _pressoir_, and the quiet trickle of the juice into the tub. The inevitable moment came, in spite of temporising, and the glass was put into my hand. The stuff was a sort of turgid magenta, thick and greyish, with little bubbles in it, and the quarter of a teaspoonful that I permitted to ooze between my lips was deadly, deadly sweet, and had a faint and dreadful warmth. That I swallowed it shows partly my good breeding and partly my extreme desire that my second cousin should not be discouraged. ‘_C’est bon? Hein?_’ said the _vigneron_. ‘_Ça vous fera du bien!_’ He said _bong_ and _biang_ in the friendly British way that they pronounce such words in the Médoc. (We had already found that if we could relax the strain, and, obeying our native instincts, talk about _vang_, and say _combiang_, we should do well with the Bordelais) I turned to watch the effect on the other victim, but found that she had retreated with extraordinary stealth and swiftness to the far end of the _cuvier_, and, having mounted one of the ladders that leaned against a giant _cuve_, was looking down into its pitchy depths. It is one of the most unamiable traits in my cousin’s character that she has neither enterprise nor good fellowship about tasting nasty things, and I immediately led the _vigneron_ to the foot of the _cuve_ with a fresh and brimming tumbler of _moût_. The wood of the great barrel was quite warm, and from within came a low humming, like a swarm of bees high up in a chimney. I went up the second ladder, and looked down into a darkness that had black gleams in it like a coal-cellar, showing where was the surface of the sweltering mass of grapes. My cousin hurried into conversation about it, regardless of the sour, heady smell of the fermentation, until we heard a voice below warning us not to stoop so long over the fumes; and then I felt that it was quite worth the disgusting flavour of _moût_ that still haunted my palate to see her come down the ladder and find the man with the tumbler waiting for her at the foot of it. I could never have believed that she would have been so lost to all sense of politeness and policy as to dodge past his extended hand and bolt through an unknown doorway into a dark room that had apparently nothing in it except a great deal of straw and a musty draught.