The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 2, February, 1862: Devoted To Literature And National PolicyVarious
History
The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 2, February, 1862: Devoted To Literature And National Policy
Various
Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; United States -- Politics and government -- 19th century -- Periodicals
While the possessor of this wealth is undergoing his morning toilet, let
us attend the steps of his butler in chief, whose duty it was to prepare
the eleven-o'clocker with which Roseton was accustomed to fortify
himself against the fatigues of the middle part of the day. Passing down
a succession of flights of stairs, each one consisting of two hundred
and twenty-five steps of the finest ebony, we at last find ourselves in
an immense cavern, dimly lighted by the internal fires of the earth,
which are here approached and verified. It was, however, left for
Roseton to discover that these flames consisted of negative qualities as
to caloric; and a project for cooling the streets of Newport by night,
in summer, by means of floods of brilliant radiance, every point of
which shall surpass the calcium light of the Museum, will soon evince to
society that Roseton has not lived in vain. It was indeed a place of
rarest temperature, and a sublime sense of personal exaltation thrilled
you as you entered. The butler approached an arch, and unlocking a
wicker door which was ingeniously contrived to admit air, but to exclude
the furtive or the inquisitive hand, threw open to your inspection the
immense wine-cellar within.
Such indeed were the dimensions of the crypt that some little time might
elapse before your eye could fully gauge them: but on accustoming
yourself to the enlarged mensuration occasioned by the unearthly light,
you saw that the cavity in question could not be less than six feet high
at the top of the arch, three feet wide, and at least forty-eight inches
deep. It was musty, cobwebbed, and encrusted with stalactic nitre, but
the spirit of rare old vintages exhaled from its depths, and visionary
clusters of purplest grapes dangled in every direction. And first your
eye lighted upon a half dozen real old India Port, picked up by golden
chance at an assignee's sale in Rivington Street. The chalk-mark on the
bottles was intended to be cabalistically private, but an acquaintance
with the occult dialect of Spanish Zingari convinced you that 1/2, meant
nothing else than that the bottles represented twelve and a half cents
each, with three years interest,--a fabulous sum, but lavished in a
direction where the pledge of a dukedom had not been irrational, if the
object could not have been otherwise accomplished. Next a row of Medoc
claimed the enraptured attention; delicately overspread with the dust of
years, but flashing through the filmy covering the undeniable blood of
the Honduras forest. Here might one well pause and indulge in Clautian
memories: the violent remonstrances of Nature against, and her
subsequent acquiescence in, the primal draughts of _vin ordinaire_,
whether expertly served by a Delmonico, or carelessly decanted by the
Hibernian attendant in the gorgeous saloon of a Taylor; next the ascent
to St. Julien, Number 2, when haply a friend from the country lingers at
the office, and you see no way of escape but an exodus in quest of
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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