The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1913. THE JUICE OF THE GRAPE.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 45, 21 February 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 21, 1913. THE JUICE OF THE GRAPE.

The year’s vintage is the subject of an interesting article in the London “Times” at the end of October, from which it appears that Europe’s crop of grapes for 1912 has by no means proved a failure. Passing on to deal generally with wine and winedrinking, we learn that of the four thousand millions of gallons of wine now produced in the world, three thousand millions come 'from Europe and twenty millions are consumed in Great Britain. The prosperity of the vinegrower is therefore of comparatively small concern to the bulk of Englishmen. Only a fraction of a gallon is drunk annually in England per head, whereas in 1 ranee last year each person was responsible for one hundred and twenty bottles. The “Times” proceeds to comment; “Wine has never entered the life or the lips of the average inhabitant of these islands to the same extent as on the Continent, and it is becoming less and less used among the increasing number of those who may bo supposed to bo able to afford it. , In an age which contemporary moralists are nob slow to decry as one of unparalleled luxury, wine-drinking occupies a comparatively insignificant place. The conditions of modern business and pleasure are opposed to all but the most moderate use of the heavier wines. The appearance of port after dinner has often little more than a ceremonial value. No doubt there are fashions in vices, and it is never quite sale; to prophesy that any particular bad habit is socially extinct. But as a fashion hard drinking will probably never recur. In the first heyday of the advent of wine into England its immoderate use was perhaps not unnatural, and may be forgiven as the brisk intemperance of a nation’s youth. But we are older now. and the very crazes of the present day such as sport and speed—baneful enough as they are to society when overdone—are incompatible with it. On tlio Continent, however, where wine has been for centuries the staple drink of the people and its common brands are less potent than those exported for the British palate, any decline or increase in its consumption is less of a social portent. The same conditions which militate against excess prevail all over Europe. But tho habit cf drinking wine ,is engrained

in the vine-producing countries, and is never likely to show much diminution, Since the vine provides innocent refreshment and honest employment to so many, there is no reason to regret the culture and spread, as far a.s climate will allow, oi the plant which Sicilian peasants still call labrusce. A temperate familiarity with its juice in the purer and milder forms is condemned by none but a

few fanatics. Custom, in its native lands, enjoins it ; in England money, permits it; religion and morality have never forbidden it. The dith\iambic stage of human development is now fairly a thing of the past. The literature of the grape attests the change; it has become almost entirely statistical.” Messrs. A\ . and A. (,’ilbey, in their annual report on the 1912 vintage conclude almost pathetically: “It is most remarkable that our consumption of such an article as wine, which is universally associated with prosperity, should show so little elasticity. While every other trade and industry can boast of increase b\ leaps and bounds, and while the income tax produces larger sums yeai by year, the consumption of wine pei head of our always increasing population has dwindled till the wine-grow-ing countries are inclined to thinl that wo have lost our headship a; the country leading in tno demand foi line wines. The causes to which ma\ be attributed the decadence of tin wine-consuming capabilities of our nation have been variously put lor ward by those interested. Jhe Temperance party, with some show ol reason attribute it to increased ab stemiousness. The curtailment al most to a vanishing point of the after dinner sitting, and that smoking com mcnces immediately, is also a bar t< consumption. Be the cause what imay, much of the poetic social enjoyment of wine has disappeared, am the drinking of the more prosaic whisky and water has largely taker its place.”