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The park so unceremoniously entered belonged to a baronet, who, though he hunted little himself, honored the sport and scorned a vulpecide, he came out naturally and begged them to lunch. Lady Guenevere refused to dismount, but consented to take a biscuit and a little Lafitte, while clarets, liqueurs, and ales, with anything else they wanted, were brought to her companions.

In comparison whiskey was brutalizing; sherry was involved with a number of material accompanying pleasures; port was purely masculine and clarets upset him; beer was a beverage and not a delight; ale a soporific; and Rhine wines he ignored.

This system of intermixing different wines, to swell the quantity of some favourite wine, is known to prevail to a great extent in those of France and Portugal. The Clarets of the London market, are principally prepared for the purpose, and, in the transit, lose much of the pure nature of the original production: and the quantity of adulterated Port that is sold in England is almost incredible.

With hor d'ourves serve vermouth, sherry, marsala or madeira wine. With soup and fish serve white wines, such as Rhein wine, sauterne or white burgundy. With entrees serve clarets or other red wines, such as Swiss, Bordeaux, Hungarian or Italian wines. Burgandy may also be served at any of the later courses. With roasts serve champagne or any of the sparkling wines.

As a rule the wine is already sound and wholesome; and if one comes to think of it, taste is a purely arbitrary matter. One forms one's taste according to a certain standard to which one is accustomed. To a man accustomed to colonial wines, clarets and hocks seem thin and sour.

I am not sure that, class for class, the rich do not show the least taste in their apparel. Many of them send to Paris for their dresses, and pay sums, which make one's mouth water, to be dressed in the latest fashion; but I fancy that the French modistes manufacture a certain style of attire for the Australian taste, just as the French merchants manufacture clarets for the Australian market.

As we straggled off to our respective beds, made up in the palankeens, according to the custom of the country, we became sensible of a serious annoyance, of which we had taken but little notice while baling in the hot curries and cool clarets within the tent.

He never moved without fully considering every phase of the consequences. Unlike most adventurers, he drank hardly anything. Half a glass of dry sherry at eleven in the morning, the same at luncheon, and one glass of claret for his dinner. Yet often at restaurants he would order champagne, choice vintage clarets, and liqueurs when occasion demanded.

Let us apply to the human race, dear brethren, what is here said of the vintages of Portugal and Gascony, and we shall have no difficulty in perceiving how many clarets aspire to be ports in their way; how most men and women of our acquaintance, how we ourselves, are Aquitanians giving ourselves Lusitanian airs; how we wish to have credit for being stronger, braver, more beautiful, more worthy than we really are.

Blue and scarlet, green and yellow, crimson and purple, orange and plum-color were the daily wear of the well-to-do; and even for the less wealthy there were the warm browns and murreys, the bottle-greens and clarets, and lavenders and buffs which made any crowd a thing to please a painter in the eighteenth century.