IV.

/The Battle of the Wines./

Temporary check to the popularity of Sparkling Champagne--Doctors disagree--The champions of Champagne and Burgundy--Péna and his patient--A young Burgundian student attacks the Wine of Reims--The Faculty of Reims in arms--A local Old Parr cited as an example in favour of the Wines of the Champagne--Salins of Beaune and Le Pescheur of Reims engage warmly in the dispute--A pelting with pamphlets--Burgundy sounds a war-note--The Sapphics of Benigné Grenan--An asp beneath the flowers--The gauntlet picked up--Carols from a Coffin--Champagne extolled as superior to all other wines--It inspires the heart and stirs the brain--The apotheosis of Champagne foam--Burgundy, an invalid, seeks a prescription--Impartially appreciative drinkers of both wines--Bold Burgundian and stout Rémois, each a jolly tippling fellow--Canon Maucroix's parallel between Burgundy and Demosthenes and Champagne and Cicero--Champagne a panacea for gout and stone--Final decision in favour of Champagne by the medical faculty of Paris--Pluche's opinion on the controversy--Champagne a lively wit and Burgundy a solid understanding--Champagne commands double the price of the best Burgundy--Zealots reconciled at table.

By a strange fatality the popularity of the sparkling wine of the Champagne, which had helped to dissipate the gloom hanging over court and capital during the last twenty years of the reign of Louis Quatorze,[131] began to wane the year preceding that monarch's death.[132] Dom Perignon too, as though stricken to the heart by this, forthwith drooped and died. The inhabitants of the province once more turned their attention to their red wines, which continued to enjoy a high reputation during the first half of the century,[133] despite the sweeping assertion that they were somewhat dry, rather flat, and possessed a strong flinty flavour,[134] the _goût de terroir_ alluded to by St. Evremond.

[Illustration]

These red wines were not only sent to Paris in large quantities by way of the Marne,[135] but commanded an important export trade, those of the Mountain, which were better able to bear the journey than the growths of the River, gracing the best-appointed tables of London, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, and the North,[136] and especially of Flanders, where they were usually sold as Burgundy.[137] It must not be lost sight of that the yield of white sparkling wine from the _crûs d'élite_ was for a long time comparatively small, especially when contrasted with that of to-day.[138] At a later period the manufacture of _vin mousseux_ increased, notably in the districts south of the Marne,[139] and drove out almost entirely the still red wine; the place of the latter being supplied, as regards Holland, Belgium, and Northern France, by the growths of Bordeaux, which were found to keep better in damp climates.[140]

[Illustration]

One cause of this falling off in the popularity of the sparkling wine arose from the great battle which raged for many years respecting the relative merits of Champagne and Burgundy. It was waged in the schools, and not in the field; for the combatants were neither dashing soldiers, brilliant courtiers, nor even gay young students, but potent, grave, and reverend physicians--the wigged, capped, and gowned pedants of the Diaphorus type whom Molière so piteously pilloried. The only blood shed was that of the grape, excepting when some enthusiastic Sangrado was impelled by a too conscientious practical examination into the qualities of the vintage he championed to a more than ordinary reckless use of the lancet. The contending armies couched pens instead of lances, and marshalled arguments in array in place of squadrons. They hurled pamphlets and theses at each others' heads in lieu of bombshells, and kept up withal a running fire of versification, so that the rumble of hexameters replaced that of artillery.

[Illustration]

National pride, and perhaps a smack of envy at the growing popularity of the still red wines of the Champagne, had, as far back as 1652, led a hot-headed young Burgundian, one Daniel Arbinet, to select as the subject of a thesis, maintained by him before the schools of Paris, the proposition that the wine of Beaune was more delicious and more wholesome than any other wine,[141] the remaining vintages of the universe being pretty roughly handled in the thesis in question. The Champenois contented themselves for the time being with cultivating their vineyards and improving their wines, till in 1677, when these latter had acquired yet more renown, M. de Révélois of Reims boldly rushed into print with the assertion that the wine of Reims was the most wholesome of all.[142] Though the first to write in its favour, he was not the first doctor of eminence who had expressed an opinion favourable to the wine of Champagne. Péna, a leading Parisian physician of the seventeenth century, was once consulted by a stranger. 'Where do you come from?' he inquired. 'I am a native of Saumur.' 'A native of Saumur. What bread do you eat?' 'Bread from the Belle Cave.' 'A native of Saumur, and you eat bread from the Belle Cave. What meat do you get?' 'Mutton fed at Chardonnet.' 'A native of Saumur, eating bread from the Belle Cave and mutton fed at Chardonnet. What wine do you drink?' 'Wine from the Côteaux.'[143] 'What! You are a native of Saumur; you eat bread from the Belle Cave, and mutton fed at Chardonnet, and drink the wine of the Côteaux, and you come here to consult me! Go along; there can be nothing the matter with you!'[144]

Burgundy remained silent in turn for nearly twenty years, when, lo, in 1696--probably just about the time when the popping of Dom Perignon's corks began to make some noise in the world--a yet more opinionated young champion of the Côte d'Or, Mathieu Fournier, a medical student, hard pressed for the subject of his inaugural thesis, and in the firm faith that

'None but a clever dialectician Can hope to become a good physician, And that logic plays an important part In the mystery of the healing art,'

propounded the theory that the wines of Reims irritated the nerves, and caused a predisposition to catarrh, gout, and other disorders, owing to which Fagon, the King's physician, had forbidden them to his royal master.[145]

[Illustration: LOUIS XIV.

(From a portrait of the time).]

Shocked at these scandalous assertions, the entire Faculty of Medicine at the Reims University rose in arms in defence of their native vintage. Its periwigged professors put their learned heads together to discuss the all-important question, 'Is the wine of Reims more agreeable and more wholesome than the wine of Burgundy?' and in 1700 Giles Culotteau embodied their combined opinions in a pamphlet published under that title.[146] After extolling the liquid purity, the excellent brightness, the divine flavour, the paradisiacal perfume, and the great durability of the wines of Ay, Pierry, Verzy, Sillery, Hautvillers, &c., as superior to those of any growth of Burgundy, he instanced the case of a local Old Parr named Pierre Pieton, a _vigneron_ of Hautvillers, who had married at the age of 110, and reached that of 118 without infirmity, as a convincing proof of the material advantages reaped from their consumption.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: ANCIENT TOWER OF REIMS UNIVERSITY.]

Salins, the _doyen_ of the Faculty of Medicine of Beaune, was intrusted with the task of replying, and in 1704 bitterly assailed Culotteau's thesis in a 'Defence of the Wine of Burgundy against the Wine of Champagne,' which ran to five editions in four years. M. le Pescheur, a doctor of Reims, vigorously attacked each of these editions in succession, maintaining amongst other things that the wine of Reims owed its renown to the many virtues discovered in it by the great lords who had accompanied Louis XIV. to his coronation; and that if the King, on the advice of his doctors, had renounced its use, his courtiers had certainly not. He also asserted that England, Germany, and the North of Europe consumed far more Champagne than they did Burgundy, and that it would be transported without risk to the end of the world, Tavernier having taken it to Persia, and another traveller to Siam and Surinam.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

The partisanship quickly spread throughout the country, and the respective admirers of Burgundy and Champagne pitilessly pelted each other in prose and verse; for the two camps had their troubadours, who, like those of old, excited the courage and ardour of the combatants. The first to sound the warlike trumpet was Benigné Grenan, professor at the college of Harcourt, who, with the rich vintage of his native province bubbling at fever-heat through his veins, sought in 1711 to crush Champagne by means of Latin sapphics, a sample of which has been thus translated:

'Lift to the skies thy foaming wine, That cheers the heart, that charms the eye; Exalt its fragrance, gift divine, Champagne, from thee the wise must fly!

A poison lurks those charms below, An asp beneath the flowers is hid; In vain thy sparkling fountains flow When wisdom has their lymph forbid.

'Tis, but when cloyed with purer fair We can with such a traitress flirt; So following Beaune with reverent air, Let Reims appear but at dessert.'[147]

The gauntlet thus contemptuously thrown down was promptly and indignantly picked up by the Rector of the University of Beauvais, the learned Dr. Charles Coffin, a native of Buzancy, near Reims, who in the quiet retirement of the Picardian _Alma Mater_ had evidently not forgotten to keep up his acquaintance with the vintage of his native province. The Latin poem he produced in reply, under the title of _Campania vindicata_,[148] had nothing in common with his lugubriously sepulchral name, as may be seen by the following somewhat freely translated extracts from it. After invoking the aid of a bottle of the enlivening liquor whose praises he is about to sing, he exclaims:

'As the vine, although lowly in aspect, outshines The stateliest trees by the produce it bears, So midst all earth's list of rich generous wines, Our Reims the bright crown of preëminence wears.

The Massica, erst sang by Horace of old, To Sillery now must abandon the field; Falernian, nor Chian, could ne'er be so bold To rival the nectar Ay's sunny slopes yield.

As bright as the goblet it sparklingly fills With diamonds in fusion, it foaming exhales An odour ambrosial, the nostril that thrills, Foretelling the flavour delicious it veils.

At first with false fury the foam-bells arise, And creamily bubbling spread over the brim, Till equally swiftly their petulance dies In a purity that makes e'en crystal seem dim.'[149]

[Illustration]

Praising the flavour of this nectar, which he declares is in every way worthy of its appearance, he stoutly defends the wine from the charge of unwholesomeness adduced against it by Grenan:

'Despite the tongue of malice, No poison in thy chalice Was ever found, Champagne! Simplicity most loyal Was e'er thy boast right royal, And this thy wines retain. No harm lurks in the fire That helps thee to inspire The heart and spur the brain.'[150]

[Illustration]

So far from causing inconvenience, he claims for Champagne the property of keeping off both gout and gravel, neither of which, he says, is known in Reims and its neighbourhood, and continues:

'When on the fruit-piled board, Thy cups, with nectar stored, Commence their genial reign, The wisest, sternest faces Of mirth display the traces, And to rejoice are fain. As laughter's silv'ry ripple Greets every glass we tipple. Away fly grief and pain.'[151]

The jovial old rector with the sepulchral appellation then proceeds, according to the most approved method of warfare, to carry the campaign into the enemy's territory. He admits the nutritive and strengthening properties of Burgundy, but demands what it possesses beyond these, which are shared in common with it by many other vintages. He then prophesies, with the return of peace,[152] the advent of the English to buy the wine of Reims; and concludes by wishing that all who dispute the merits of Champagne may find nothing to drink but the sour cider of Normandy or the acrid vintage of Ivri. The citizens of Reims, thoroughly alive to the importance of the controversy, were enchanted with this production; they did not, however, crown the poet with laurel, but more wisely and appropriately despatched to him four dozen of their best red and gray wines, by the aid of which he continued to tipple and to sing.

Grenan, resuming the offensive in turn, at once addressed an epistle in Latin verse, in favour of Burgundy against Champagne, to Fagon, the King's physician.[153] Complaining that the latter wine lays claim unjustly to the first rank, he allows it certain qualities--brilliancy, purity, limpidity, a subtle savour that touches the most blunted palate, and an aroma so delicious that it is impossible to resist its attractions. But he objects to its pretensions.

'Its vinous flood, with swelling pride In foaming wavelets welling up, Pours forth its bright and sparkling tide, Bubbling and glittering in the cup.'[154]

He goes on to accuse the Champenois poet of being unduly inspired by this wine, the effects of which he finds apparent in his inflated style and his attempts to place Champagne in the first rank, and make all other vintages its subjects; and he reiterates his allegations that, unlike Burgundy, it affects both the head and the stomach, and is bound to produce gout and gravel in its systematic imbibers. He concludes by begging Fagon to pronounce in his favour, as having proved the virtues of Burgundy on the King himself, whose strength had been sustained by it. The retort was sharp and to the point, taking the form of a twofold epigram from an anonymous hand:

'To the doctor to go On behalf of your wine Is, as far as I know, Of its sickness a sign.

Your cause and your wine Must be equally weak, Since to check their decline A prescription you seek.'[155]

Nor was the poet of the funereal cognomen backward in stepping into the field; for he published a metrical decree, supposed to be issued by the faculty of the island of Cos in the fourth year of the ninety-first Olympiad,[156] in which, though a verdict is nominally given in favour of Burgundy, Grenan's pleas on behalf of this wine are treated with withering sarcasm.

But whilst these enthusiastic partisans thus belaboured one another, there were not wanting impartial spirits who could recognise that there were merits on both sides. Bellechaume, in an ode jointly addressed to the two combatants,[157] adjures them to live at peace on Parnassus, and, remembering that Horace praised both Falernian and Massica, to jointly animate their muse with Champagne and Burgundy:

'To learn the difference between The wine of Reims and that of Beaune, The fairest plan would be, I ween, To drink them both, not one alone.'[158]

Another equally judicious versifier called also on the Burgundian champion[159] to cease the futile contest, since

'Bold Burgundian ever glories With stout Remois to get mellow; Each well filled with vinous lore is Each a jolly tippling fellow.'[160]

And the learned Canon Maucroix of Reims exhibited a similar conciliatory spirit in the ingenious parallel which he drew between the two greatest orators of antiquity and the wines of the Marne and the Côte d'Or. 'In the wine of Burgundy,' he observes, 'there is more strength and vigour; it does not play with its man so much, it overthrows him more suddenly,--that is Demosthenes. The wine of Champagne is subtler and more delicate; it amuses more and for a longer time, but in the end it does not produce less effect,--that is Cicero.'[161]

[Illustration: REMAINS OF THE GATE OF BACCHUS, NEAR REIMS UNIVERSITY.]

The national disasters which marked the close of the reign of Louis XIV. diverted public attention in some degree from the nugatory contest;[162] and though Fontenelle sought to prove that a glass of Champagne was better than a bottle of Burgundy,[163] the impartially appreciative agreed with Panard that

'Old Burgundy and young Champagne At table boast an equal reign.'[164]

But the doctors continued to disagree, and new generations of them still went on wrangling over the vexed questions of supremacy and salubrity. In 1739 Jean François carried the war into the enemy's camp by maintaining at Paris that Burgundy caused gout; and a little later Robert Linguet declared the wine of Reims to be as healthy as it was agreeable. In 1777 Xavier, Regent of the Faculty of Medicine at the Reims University, affirmed that not only did the once vilified _vin mousseux_ share with the other wines of the Champagne the absence of the tartarous particles which in many red wines are productive of gout and gravel, but that the gas it contained caused it to act as a dissolvent upon stone in the human body, and was also invaluable, from its antiseptic qualities, in treating putrid fevers.[165] Further, the appropriately named Champagne Dufresnay established, to his own satisfaction and that of his colleagues, that the wine was superior to any other growth, native or foreign.[166] At length, in 1778, when the bones of the original disputants were dust, and their lancets rust, on the occasion of a thesis being defended before the Faculty of Medicine of Paris, a verdict was formally pronounced by this body in favour of the wine of the Champagne.[167]

[Illustration]

[Illustration]