1879 Facts About Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines

Champagne and Other Sparkling Wines.

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- be sent to his friend the Hon. John Butler, Molesworth Street, Dublin, "who if contented with the wine will become a O'Ood cus- "' tomer, he being rich, keeping a good house, and receiving many amateurs of vin de champagne." Shortly afterwards the chevalier himself receives 50 bottles of still wine, vintage 1783. In 1789 120 bottles of champagne, vintage 1788, are supplied to" Milord" Findlater, of London-an ancestor, no doubt, of the wine-mer– chants of the same name carrying on business to·day, and whom the Moets in their simplicity dubbed a "Milord"-and in 1790 the customers of the house include Power and Michel, of 44, Lamb Street, London, and Manning, of the St. Alban Tavern, the latter of whom is supplied on March 30th with 130 bottles of champagne at three livres, or two " schillings," per bottle; while a month later Mr. Lockart, banker, of 36, Pall Mall, is debited with 360 bottles, vintage 1788, at three shillings. In this same year M. Moet despatches a traveller to England named J eanson, and his letters, some two hundred in number, are all preserved in the archives of the house. On the l 7th May, 1790, he writes from London as follows:-" As yet I have only gone on preparatory and often useless errands. I have dis– tributed samples of which I have no news. Patience is neces– sarv and I endeavour to provide myself with it. How the taste - ' of this country has changed since ten years ago! Almost every- where they ask for dry wine, but at the same time require it so vinous and so strong that there is scarcely any other than the wine of Sillery which can satisfy them. . To-morrow I dine five miles from here, a't M. Macnamara's. We shall uncork four bottles of our wine, which will probably be all right." In • May, 1792, Jean Remi Moet is married, and thenceforward assumes the full management of the house. On December 20 of the year following, when the Reign of Terror was fairly inau– gurated, we :find the accounts in the ledger opened to this or the other " citoyen." The orthodox Republican formula, how– ever, did not long continue, and" sieur" and" monsieur" resumed their accustomed places, showing that J ean Remi Moet had no sympathy with the Jacobin faction of the day. In 1805 he be-