1880 Facts about Port and Madeira by Henry Vizetelly

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In the Port Wine Country.

down the Stream—The Surrounding Hills terraced from base to summit, and covered with Vines—Carolling Vintagers and Screeching Bullock- carts—Mules halt at the Fountain while their Drivers tipple at the Venda —^Visitthe Quinta da Boa Vista—The Vintagein full operation—Treading the Grapes—Vintagers brought from remote parts—Their Pay, Food, and Sleeping Accommodation—The Casa dos Lagares and Adega of the Quinta. It was niglit-time whenIleft Lisbon; and when day dawned the train was rnnning past well-cultivated fields divided by hedges, past patches of maize and ohve and orange trees, and little white cottages shaded by arcades of vines, with groves of pines stretching awayin the distance where glimpses were caught ofthe little chui-ch steeple and low white houses of some neigh bouring town. Men and hoys were busy reaping maize, and along the roads peasant-women in flat round hats, with shawls mufiSed round their throats, but with their feet, as usual, bare, were trudging, with big baskets balanced on their heads, to market. Farther on the line runs by the verge of marshes, giving glimpses of canals, along which farmer-fishermen propel their high-prowed canoe-like boats beside the waving rice plan tations; then intersects a pine- foi-est, where bullock - carts, whose drivers are oftener women and children than men, go plunging through the sandy roads, and where pleasant peeps are had,through the breaks in the trees, of quiet villages and green sequestered nooks. At last the sea is sighted, and we sweep pastsome bathing station,with its flimsylittle housesand tiny gay pavilions; after which there is bttle else than a suc cession of pine-woods up to the environs of Oporto, which bursts n suddenly into view, picturesquely perched on the crown of a steep hill. Early the following morning we took the train to Cahide, where a carriage was to he in waiting to convey us to the heart of the Port-wine district. After leaving Oporto the Entre- Douro-e-Minho country is imdulating andfertile,though at times covered with heath and overgrown with pines. The bttle stone cottages are hemmed in by fruit-trees; while the vines run along lengthy corridors or clamber up the trees at the borders