never claimed any sort of relationship with sparkling wine, but was a species of unsophisticated ale, brewed from wheat, or oats, with a little bean-meal occasionally introduced; in fact, the sort of stuff we use in the present century to fatten bacon pigs upon. And “mum” has _not_ been the word with British brewers for some time past. Champagne has been made in England for a considerable period; but since the closing of the “night-houses” in Panton Street the trade therein has not been very brisk. During the present century champagne in this country—and I grieve to add in France as well—has been chiefly fabricated from apples, and other fruits; but here is a much older way of making _English Champagne_. Take to three gallons of water nine pounds of Lisbon sugar; boil the water and sugar half an hour, scum it clean, then have one gallon of currants pick’d, but not bruis’d, pour the liquor boiling hot over them, and when cold work it with half a pint of balm two days; then pour it through a flannel or sieve, then put it into a barrel fit for it with half an ounce of ising-glass well bruis’d. When it has done working stop it close for a month, then bottle {41} it, and in every bottle put a very small lump of double-refin’d sugar. This is excellent wine, and has a beautiful colour. “Life without Ebulum,” writes a friend, an instructor of youth in the ingenuous arts, in forwarding me the recipe, “is a void to most people who have not cultivated the eringo root in their back gardens.” I have never tasted ebulum, preferring my ale neat and unadorned, but this is how to prepare _Ebulum_. To a hogshead of strong ale take a heap’d bushel of elderberries, and half a pound of juniper berries beaten; put in all the berries when you put in the hops, and let them boil together till the berries break in pieces; then work it up as you do ale. When it has done working, add to it half a pound of ginger, half an ounce of cloves, as much mace, an ounce of nutmegs, and as much cinnamon grosly beaten, half a pound of citron, as much eringo root, and likewise of candied orange-peel. Let the sweetmeats be cut in pieces very thin, and put with the spice into a bag, and hang it in the vessel when you stop it up. So let it stand till ’tis fine, then bottle it up, and drink it with lumps of double-refin’d sugar in the glass. One of the quaintest beverages of which I ever heard, or read, is _Cock Ale_.