1876 Facts About Sherry by Henry Vizetelly

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Facts about Sherry.

■wHcli have become blackened by age—full-bodied, -well-roimded ■wines, the perfect mello'wness of which half a century has not impaired. There, too, we were shown several finely-matured amontillados; also a wine of the old Jerez type, which carried its thirty years buoyantly; and some comparatively juvenile, fresh-tasting, and peculiarly fragrant finos. Within a stone's throw of the Jerez bull-ring is the spacious bodega of Mr. E. Davies, who has the Torre Breva -vineyard at San Lucar, and is proprietor of the celebrated Eibero Seco vineyard, which produces the finest wine in Madeira, where he also owns the villa and gardens of La Vigia, occupied by the Empress of Austria during her residence on that island. Mr. Davies, who takes the lead in the various sports -with which the English community settled at Jerez seek to relieve the monotony of an existence sacrificed to the rearing, blending, and shipping of "svine for the benefit of their fellow-countiymen, includes in his various stock some fine varieties. At his bodega we tasted a -wine kno-wn to the clientele of the house as la Wovia, an excellent amontillado sufficiently old to have developed its finer qualities, and yet light and delicate. We were also shown a beautifully-rounded wine from an ancient solera of Don Miguel Viton's, some remarkably potent rare old -wine, and several very delicate finos and manzanillas of different ages from the Torre Breva vineyard, the vintage at whichwe have described. Mr. J.C. Gordon,likehis neighbour Mr.E.Davies,is awine-grower as well as a shipper. He o-wns one of the vineyards of the plain which in good years produces 300 butts of wine. At his bodega we met -with some fine fragrant olorosos, an old and potent East India bro-wn sherry, and several high-class finos perfectly matured. In this quarter of Jerez the bodega in which Senor J. J. Vegas has recently installed himself is situated. His principal -wines are of that type which was in such high favour before the fashion for paler, and too often inferior, varieties set in. The samples we tasted here were from soleras composed of some of the best gro-wths of the Machamudo and Carrascal districts, rounded by a judicious blending of a