Chapter IV: Part 4

M. Duchâtel-Ohaus's central establishment is in the Rue des Deux Anges, one of the most ancient streets of Reims, running from the Rue des Élus to the Rue de Vesle, and having every window secured by iron gratings, and every door thickly studded with huge nails. These prison-like façades succeed each other in gloomy monotony along either side of the way, the portion of M. Duchâtel-Ohaus's residence which faces the street being no exception to the general rule. Once within its court, however, and quite a different scene presents itself. Before us is a pleasant little flower-garden with a small but charming Renaissance house looking on to it, the windows ornamented with elaborate mouldings, and surmounted by graceful sculptured heads, while at one corner rises a tower with a sun-dial displayed on its front. Here and in an adjoining house the canons of the Cathedral were accustomed to reside in the days when four-fifths of Reims belonged to the Church.

From the garden we enter a capacious cellier where the blending and bottling of the wine takes place, and in the neighbouring packing-room encounter a score of workpeople filling, securing, and branding a number of cases about to be despatched by rail. From the cellier we pass to the cellars situated immediately underneath, and which, capacious though they are, do not suffice for M. Duchâtel's stock, portions of which are stored in some ancient vaults near the market-place, and in the Rue de Vesle behind the church of St. Jacques. This church, originally built at the close of the twelfth century, is hemmed in on all sides by old houses, above which rises its tapering steeple surmounted by a medieval weathercock in the form of an angel. A life-size statue of the patron saint decorates the Gothic gateway leading to the church, from which a troop of Remish urchins in the charge of some Frères de la Doctrine Chrétienne emerge as we pass by.

The Cour St. Jacques, where M. Duchâtel's cellars are situated, may be reached by passing through the church, the interior of which presents a curious jumble of architectural styles from early Gothic to late Renaissance. One noteworthy object of art which it contains is a life-size crucifix carved by Pierre Jacques, a Remish sculptor of the days of the Good King Henri, and from an anatomical point of view a perfect _chef-d'oeuvre_. The cellars we have come to inspect are two stories deep, and comprise numerous ancient cavernous compartments, such as are found in all the older quarters of Reims, and usually in the vicinity of some church, convent, or clerical abode. It has been suggested that they were either crypts for sacred retirement and prayer, dungeons for the punishment of recreant brethren, or tombs for the dead; but it is far more probable that in the majority of instances they served then as now simply for the storage of the choice vintages of the Marne, for we all know the monks of old were tipplers of no ordinary capacity, who usually contrived to secure the best that the district provided. These vaults of M. Duchâtel's, in which a considerable stock of the fine wine of 1874 is stored, are from two to three centuries old, and probably belonged to the curés of St. Jacques. They are of considerable extent, are well ventilated, and are walled and roofed with stone. M. Duchâtel's remaining stock reposes in some new cellars--certain transformed chalk quarries outside the Porte Dieu-Lumière, comprising broad lofty galleries and vast circular chambers--fifty feet or so in height and well lighted from above.

At M. Duchâtel-Ohaus's we tasted a variety of fine samples of his brand, including a beautiful wine of 1868 and an almost equally good one of 1870, with some of the excellent vintage of 1874, which was then being prepared for shipment.

VIII.--THE REIMS ESTABLISHMENTS (_continued_).

M. Ernest Irroy's Cellars, Vineyards, and Vendangeoirs-- Recognition
by the Reims Agricultural Association of his Plantations of Vines--
His Wines and their Popularity at the best London Clubs-- Messrs.
Binet fils and Co.'s Establishment-- Wines Sold by the Firm to
Shippers-- Their Cellars-- Samples of Fine Still Ay and Bouzy--
Their Still Sillery, Vintage 1857, and their Creaming Vin Brut,
Vintage 1865-- The Offices and Cellars of Messrs. Charles Farre and
Co.-- Testing the Wine before Bottling-- A Promenade between Bottles
in Piles and Racks-- Repute in which these Wines are held in England
and on the Continent-- The New Establishment of Fisse, Thirion, and
Co. in the Place de Betheny-- Its Construction exclusively in Stone,
Brick, and Iron-- The Vast Celliers of Two Stories-- Bottling the
Wine by the Aid of Machinery-- The Cool and Lofty Cellars--
Ingenious Method of Securing the Corks, rendering the Uncorking
exceedingly simple-- The Wines Shipped by the Firm.

Few large manufacturing towns like Reims--one of the most important of those engaged in the woollen manufacture in France--can boast of such fine promenades and such handsome boulevards as the capital of the Champagne. As the ancient fortifications of the city were from time to time razed, their site was levelled and generally planted with trees, so that the older quarters of Reims are almost encircled by broad and handsome thoroughfares, separating the city, as it were, from its outlying suburbs. In or close to the broad Boulevard du Temple, which takes its name from its proximity to the site of the ancient Commanderie of the Templars, various champagne manufacturers, including M. Louis Roederer, M. Ernest Irroy, and M. Charles Heidsieck, have their establishments, while but a few paces off, in the neighbouring Rue Coquebert, are the large and handsome premises of Messrs. Krug and Co.

The offices of M. Ernest Irroy, who is known in Reims not merely as a large champagne grower and shipper, but also as a distinguished amateur of the fine arts, taking a leading part in originating local exhibitions and the like, are attached to his private residence, a handsome mansion flanked by a large and charming garden in the Boulevard du Temple. The laying out of this sylvan oasis is due to M. Vadré, the head gardener of the city of Paris, who contributed so largely to the picturesque embellishment of the Bois de Boulogne. M. Irroy's establishment, which comprises a considerable range of buildings grouped around two courtyards, is immediately adjacent, although its principal entrance is in the Rue de la Justice. The vast celliers, covering an area of upwards of 3,000 square yards, and either stocked with wine in cask or used for packing and similar purposes, afford the requisite space for carrying on a most extensive business. The cellars beneath comprise three stories, two of which are solidly roofed and lined with masonry, while the lowermost one is excavated in the chalk. They are admirably constructed on a symmetrical plan, and their total surface is very little short of 7,000 square yards. Spite of the great depth to which these cellars descend they are perfectly dry, the ventilation is good, and their temperature moreover is remarkably cool, one result of which is that M. Irroy's loss from breakage never exceeds four per cent. per annum. M. Irroy holds a high position as a vineyard-proprietor in the Champagne, his vines covering an area of nearly 86 acres. At Mareuil and Avenay he owns some twenty-five acres, at Verzenay and Verzy about fifteen, and at Ambonnay and Bouzy forty-six acres. His father and his uncle, whose properties he inherited or purchased, commenced some thirty years ago to plant vines on certain slopes of Bouzy possessing a southern aspect, and he has followed their example with such success both at Bouzy and Ambonnay that in 1873 the Reims Agricultural Association conferred upon him a silver-gilt medal for his plantations of vines. M. Irroy owns _vendangeoirs_ at Verzenay, Avenay, and Ambonnay; and at Bouzy, where his largest vineyards are, he has built some excellent cottages for his labourers. He has also constructed a substantial bridge over the ravine which, formed by winter torrents from the hills, intersects the principal vineyard slopes of Bouzy.

M. Ernest Irroy's wines, prepared with scrupulous care and rare intelligence, have been known in England for some years past, and are steadily increasing in popularity. They are emphatically connoisseurs' wines. The best West-end clubs, such as White's, Arthur's, the old Carlton, and the like, lay down the _cuvées_ of this house in good years as they lay down their vintage ports and finer clarets, and drink them, not in a crude state, but when they are in perfection--that is, in five to ten years' time. M. Irroy exports to the British colonies and to the United States the same fine wines which he ships to England.

From M. Irroy's we proceeded to Messrs. Binet fils and Co., whose establishment in the Rue de la Justice is separated from that of M. Irroy merely by a narrow path, and occupies the opposite side of the way to the principal establishment of M. Louis Roederer. The firm of Binet fils and Co. was founded many years ago, but for a long time they sold their wines principally to other shippers on the Reims and Epernay markets, where their cuvées were held in high repute, and only of recent years have they applied themselves to the shipping trade. Their establishment has two entrances, one in the Rue de la Justice, and the other in the Boulevard du Champ de Mars. On passing through the former we find ourselves in a courtyard of considerable area, with a range of celliers in the rear and a low building on the left, in which the offices are installed. In the first cellier we encounter cases and baskets of champagne all ready to be despatched by rail, with women and men busily engaged in labelling and packing other bottles which continue to arrive from the cellars below in baskets secured to an endless chain. Beyond this range of celliers is another courtyard of smaller dimensions where there are additional celliers in which wines of recent vintages in casks are stored.

The vaults, which are reached by a winding stone staircase, are spacious, and consist of a series of parallel and uniform galleries hewn in the chalk without either masonry supports or facings. Among the solid piles of bottles which here hem us in on all sides are a considerable number of magnums and imperial pints reserved for particular customers--the former more especially for certain military messes, at which the brand of Binet fils and Co. is held in deserved esteem. We tasted here--in addition to several choice sparkling wines, including a grand _vin brut_, vintage 1865--a still Ay of the year 1870, and some still Bouzy of 1874. The former, a remarkably light and elegant wine, was already in fine condition for drinking, while the latter, which was altogether more vinous, deeper in colour, and fuller in body needed the ripening influence of time to bring it to perfection. Through their agents, Rutherford, Drury, and Co., Messrs. Binet fils and Co. achieved a great success in England with their still Sillery, vintage 1857, and subsequently with their superb creaming _vin brut_, vintage 1865, of which we have just spoken, and which is still to be met with at London clubs of repute.

Some short distance from and parallel with the Rue de la Justice is the Rue Jacquart, where Messrs. Charles Farre and Co., of whose establishment at Hautvillers we have already spoken, have their offices and cellars. We enter a large courtyard, where several railway vans are being laden with cases of wine from the packing-hall beyond, and in the tasting-room adjoining find wine being tested prior to bottling, to ascertain the amount of saccharine it contains. This was accomplished by reducing a certain quantity of wine by boiling down to one-sixth, when the saccharometer should indicate 13° of sugar to ensure each bottle containing the requisite quantity of compressed carbonic acid gas.

Messrs. Farre's cellars, comprising eighteen parallel galleries disposed in two stories, are both lofty and commodious, and are mainly of recent construction, the upper ones being solidly walled with masonry, while those below are simply excavated in the chalk. Here, as elsewhere, one performed a lengthened promenade between piles after piles of bottles of the finer vintages and a seemingly endless succession of racks, at which workmen were engaged in dislodging the sediment in the wine by the dim light of a tallow candle. It was here that we were assured the more experienced of these men were capable, when working with both hands, of shaking the enormous number of 50,000 bottles a day, or at the rate of seventy to the minute.

The fine wines of Messrs. Charles Farre and Co. have long enjoyed a well-deserved celebrity, and at the Paris Exhibition of 1855 the firm secured the highest medal awarded to champagnes. The high repute in which the brand is held on the Continent is evidenced by the fact that the Prussian and other courts are consumers of Messrs. Farre's wines. The firm not only number England, Germany, Austria, Russia, and Northern Europe, and, as a matter of course, France, among their customers, but also several of the British colonies and North and South America as well.

The new establishment of Messrs. Fisse, Thirion, and Co., in the erection of which they have largely profited by their experience and the various resources of modern science, is situated in the Place de Betheny, in the vicinity of the railway goods station and the local shooting range, largely resorted to at certain seasons of the year, when the crack shots of the Champagne capital compete with distinguished amateurs from different parts of France and the other side of the Channel.

On entering the courtyard through the iron gate to the right of the dwelling-houses of the resident partners--flanked by gardens brilliant with flowers and foliage--we first reach the offices and tasting-rooms, and then the entrance to the cellars. A speciality of this important pile of building is that everything employed in its construction is of stone, brick, or iron, wood having been rigorously excluded from it. In the rear of the courtyard, which presents that aspect of animation common to flourishing establishments in the Champagne, is the principal cellier, with a small building in front, where a steam-pump for pumping up water from the chalk is installed, while at right angles with the cellier are the stables and bottle-sheds. The large cellier, which is 20 feet high and 80 feet broad, will be no less than 260 feet in length when completed. It contains two stories, the floors of both of which are cemented, the lower story being roofed with small brick arches connected by iron girders, and the upper one with tiles resting on iron supports. The cement keeps the temperature remarkably cool in the lower cellier where wine in cask is stored, the upper cellier being appropriated to wine in racks _sur pointe_, bales of corks, and the wicker-baskets and cases in which the wine is packed.

The preparation of the wines in cask and the bottling take place in the lower of the two celliers, a mere lad being enabled, by the aid of the mechanism provided, to bottle from six to eight thousand bottles a day. A single workman can cork about 4,500 bottles, which a second workman secures with metal agrafes before they are lowered into the cellars. The latter are of two stories, each being divided into three long parallel galleries 20 feet high and 23 feet wide, vaulted with stone and floored with cement. Bordering the endless stacks of bottles are small gutters, into which the wine flows from the exploded bottles. Lofty, well ventilated, and beautifully cool, the temperature invariably ranging from 45° to 47° Fahrenheit, these capitally-constructed cellars combine all that is required for a champagne establishment of the first class. The breakage has never exceeded 3 per cent., whereas in some old cellars which the firm formerly occupied in the centre of the city, their breakage on one occasion amounted to ten times this quantity.

At Fisse, Thirion, and Co.'s, after the wine has been disgorged and liqueured, the corks are secured neither with string nor wire, but a special metal fastener is employed for the purpose. This consists of a triple-branched agrafe, provided with a kind of hinge. A tiny toy needle-gun suspended to the agrafe is pulled outwards and turned over the top of the bottle, whereupon the fastening becomes instantly disengaged, and anything like trouble, uncleanliness, or annoyance is entirely avoided. The operation is so easy that a mere child can open a bottle of champagne, secured by this patent fastener, as easily and rapidly as a grown-up man.

The firm of Fisse, Thirion, and Co. succeeded that of Fisse, Fraiquin, and Co.--established originally at Reims in 1821--in 1864, when the brand of the house was already well known on the Continent, more especially in Belgium and Holland. Since that time the wines have been largely introduced into England and the United States, and the firm, who have secured medals at many of the recent exhibitions, to-day have agents in the English and Dutch Indies and the various European settlements in China. Several descriptions of wine are shipped by the house, the finest being their dry Cuvée Reservèe and their fragrant soft-tasting Cachet d'Or.

IX.--THE REIMS ESTABLISHMENTS (_concluded_).

La Prison de Bonne Semaine-- Mary Queen of Scots at Reims-- Messrs.
Pommery and Greno's Offices-- A Fine Collection of Faïence-- The Rue
des Anglais a former Refuge of English Catholics-- Remains of the
Old University of Reims-- Ancient Roman Tower and Curious Grotto--
The handsome Castellated Pommery Establishment-- The Spacious
Cellier and Huge Carved Cuvée Tun-- The Descent to the Cellars--
Their Great Extent-- These Lofty Subterranean Chambers Originally
Quarries-- Ancient Places of Refuge of the Early Christians and the
Protestants-- Madame Pommery's Splendid Cuvée of 1868-- Messrs. de
St. Marceaux and Co.'s New Establishment in the Avenue de Sillery--
Its Garden-Court and Circular Shaft-- Animated Scene in the Large
Packing Hall-- Lowering Bottled Wine to the Cellars-- Great Depth
and Extent of these Cellars-- Messrs. de St. Marceaux and Co.'s
Various Wines.

Nigh the cathedral of Reims and in the rear of the archiepiscopal palace there runs a short narrow street known as the Rue Vauthier le Noir, and frequently mentioned in old works relating to the capital of the Champagne. The discovery of various pillars and statues, together with a handsome Gallo-Roman altar, whilst digging some foundations in 1837, points to the fact that a Pagan temple formerly occupied the site. The street is supposed to have taken its name, however, from some celebrated gaoler, for in mediæval times here stood "la prison de bonne semaine." On the site of this prison a château was subsequently built where Mary Queen of Scots is said to have resided in the days when her uncle, Cardinal Charles de Lorraine, was Lord Archbishop of Reims. Temple, prison, and palace have alike disappeared, and where they stood there now rises midway between court and garden a handsome mansion, the residence of Madame Pommery, head of the well-known firm of Pommery and Greno. To the left of the courtyard, which is entered through a monumental gateway, are some old buildings bearing the sculptured escutcheon of the beautiful and luckless Stuart Queen, while to the right are the offices, with the manager's sanctum, replete with artistic curiosities, the walls being completely covered with remarkable specimens of faïence, including Rouen, Gien, Palissy, Delft, and majolica, collected in the majority of instances by Madame Pommery in the villages around Reims. Here we were received by M. Vasnier, who at once volunteered to accompany us to the cellars of the firm outside the city. Messrs. Pommery and Greno originally carried on business in the Rue Vauthier le Noir, where there are extensive cellars, but their rapidly-increasing connection long since compelled them to emigrate beyond the walls of Reims.

In close proximity to the Rue Vauthier le Noir is the Rue des Anglais, so named from the English Catholic refugees who, flying from the persecutions of our so-called Good Queen Bess, here took up their abode and established a college and a seminary. They rapidly acquired great influence in Reims, and one of their number, William Gifford, was even elected archbishop. At the end of this street, nigh to Madame Pommery's, there stands an old house with a corner tower and rather handsome Renaissance window, which formerly belonged to some of the clergy of the cathedral, and subsequently became the "Bureau Général de la Loterie de France," abolished by the National Convention in 1793.

The Rue des Anglais conducts into the Rue de l'Université, where a few remnants of the old University, founded by Cardinal Charles de Lorraine (1538-74), attract attention, notably a conical-capped corner tower, the sculptured ornaments at the base of which have crumbled into dust beneath the corroding tooth of Time. From the Rue de l'Université our way lies along the Boulevard du Temple to the Porte Gerbert, about a mile beyond which there rises up the curious castellated structure in which the Pommery establishment is installed, and whose tall towers command a view of the whole of Reims and its environs. As we drive up the Avenue Gerbert we espy on the right an isolated crumbling Roman tower, a remnant of the days when Reims disputed with Trèves the honour of being the capital of Belgic Gaul. Close at hand, and almost under the walls of the old fortifications, is a grotto to which an ancient origin is likewise ascribed. In another minute we reach the open iron gates of Messrs. Pommery's establishment, flanked by a picturesque porter's lodge, and proceeding up a broad drive alight under a Gothic portico at the entrance to the spacious and lofty cellier. Iron columns support the roof of this vast hall, at one end of which is the office and tasting-room, provided with a telegraphic apparatus by means of which communication is carried on with the Reims bureaux. Stacked up on every side of the cellier, and when empty often in eight tiers, are rows upon rows of casks, 4,000 of which contain wine of the last vintage, sufficient for a million bottles of champagne. The temperature of this hall is carefully regulated; the windows are high up near the roof, the sun's rays are rigidly excluded, so that a pleasant coolness pervades the apartment. On the left-hand side stands the huge tun, capable of containing 5,500 gallons of wine, in which the firm make their _cuvée_, with the monogram P and G, surmounting the arms of Reims, carved on its head. A platform, access to which is gained by a staircase in a side aisle, runs round this tonneau; and boys stand here when the wine is being blended, and by means of a handle protruding above the cask work the paddle-wheels placed inside, thereby securing the complete amalgamation of the wine, which has been hoisted up in casks and poured through a metal trough into the tonneau. Adjoining are the chains and lifts worked by steam by means of which wine is raised and lowered from and to the cellars beneath, one lift raising or lowering eight casks, whether full or empty, in the space of a minute.

At the farther end of the hall a Gothic door, decorated with ornamental ironwork, leads to the long broad flight of steps 116 in number and nearly twelve feet in width, conducting to the suite of lofty subterranean chambers where bottles of _vin brut_ repose in their hundreds of thousands in slanting racks or solid piles, passing leisurely through those stages of development necessary to fit them for the _dégorgeur_. Altogether there are thirty large shafts, which were originally quarries, and are now connected by spacious galleries. This side of Reims abounds with similar quarries, which are believed to have served as places of refuge for the Protestants at the time of the League and after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and it is even conjectured that the early Christians, the followers of St. Sixtus and St. Sinicus, here hid themselves from their persecutors. Since the cellars within the city have no longer sufficed for the storage of the immense stocks required through the development of the champagne trade, these vast subterranean galleries have been successfully utilised by various firms. Messrs. Pommery, after pumping out the water with which the chambers were filled, proceeded to excavate the intersecting tunnels, shore up the cracking arches, and repair the flaws in the chalk with masonry, finally converting these abandoned quarries into magnificent cellars for the storage of champagne. No less than £60,000 was spent upon them and the castellated structure aboveground. The underground area is almost 240,000 square feet, and a million bottles of champagne can be stored in these capacious vaults.

Madame Pommery made a great mark with her splendid _cuvée_ of 1868, and since this time her brand has become widely popular, the Pommery Sec especially being highly appreciated by connoisseurs.

On leaving Messrs. Pommery's we retrace our steps down the Avenue Gerbert, bordered on either side with rows of plane-trees, until we reach the treeless Avenue de Sillery, where Messrs. de Saint Marceaux and Co.'s new and capacious establishment is installed. The principal block of building is flanked by two advanced wings inclosing a garden-court, set off with flowers and shrubs, and from the centre of which rises a circular shaft, covered in with glass, admitting light and air to the cellars below. In the building to the left the wine is received on its arrival from the vineyard, and here are ranged hundreds of casks replete with the choice _crûs_ of Verzenay, Ay, Cramant, and Bouzy, while some thousands of bottles ready for labelling are stocked in massive piles at the end of the packing-hall in the corresponding wing of the establishment. Here, too, a tribe of workpeople are arraying the bottles with gold and silver headdresses and robing them in pink paper, while others are filling, securing, marking, and addressing the cases or baskets to Hong-Kong, San Francisco, Yokohama, Bombay, London, New York, St. Petersburg, Berlin, or Paris.

The wine in cask, stored in the left-hand wing, after having been duly blended in a vast vat holding over 2,400 gallons, is drawn off into bottles, which are then lowered down a shaft to the second tier of cellars by means of an endless chain, on to which the baskets of bottles are swiftly hooked. The workman engaged in this duty, in order to prevent his falling down the shaft, has a leather belt strapped round his waist, by means of which he is secured to an adjoining iron column. We descend into the lower cellars down a flight of ninety-three broad steps--a depth equal to the height of an ordinary six-storied house--and find no less than four-and-twenty galleries excavated in the chalk, without any masonry supports, and containing upwards of a million bottles of champagne. The length of these galleries varies, but they are of a uniform breadth, allowing either a couple of racks with wine _sur pointe_, or stacks of bottles, in four rows on either side, with an ample passage down the centre.

The upper range of cellars comprises two large arched galleries of considerable breadth, one of which contains wine in wood and wine _sur pointe_, while the other is stocked with bottles of wine heads downward, ready to be delivered into the hands of the _dégorgeur_.

MM. de St. Marceaux and Co. have the honour of supplying the King of the Belgians, the President of the French Republic, and several German potentates, with an exceedingly delicate champagne known as the Royal St. Marceaux. The same wine is popular in Russia and other parts of Europe, just as the Dry Royal of the firm is much esteemed in the United States. The brand of the house most appreciated in this country is its Carte d'Or, a very dry wine which, in conjunction with the firm's Extra Quality, secured the first place at a recent champagne competition in England.

In the neighbourhood of the Pommery and de St. Marceaux establishments numerous other champagne manufacturers have their cellars formed from the abandoned quarries so numerous on this side of the city. Of some of these firms we have already spoken, but there remain to be mentioned Messrs. Kunklemann and Co., Ruinart père et fils, George Goulet, Jules Champion, Théophile Roederer, &c. The cellars of the three last-named are immediately outside the Porte Dieu-Lumière, near which is a house with a curious bas-relief on its face, the subject of which has been a source of much perplexity to local antiquaries.

X.--EPERNAY CHAMPAGNE ESTABLISHMENTS.

Early Records of the Moët Family at Reims and Epernay-- Jean Remi
Moët Founder of the Commerce in Champagne Wines-- Extracts from the
Old Account-Books of the Moëts-- First Sales of Sparkling Wines--
Sales to England in 1788-- "Milords" Farnham and Findlater-- Jean
Remi Moët receives the Emperor Napoleon, Josephine, and the King of
Westphalia-- The Firm of Moët and Chandon Constituted-- Their
Establishment in the Rue du Commerce-- Delivering and Washing the
New Bottles-- The Numerous Vineyards and Vendangeoirs of the Firm--
Making the Cuvée in Vats of 12,000 Gallons-- The Bottling of the
Wine by 200 Hands-- A Hundred Thousand Bottles Completed Daily--
20,000 Francs' worth of Broken Glass in Two Years-- A Subterranean
City, with miles of Streets, Cross Roads, Open Spaces, Tramways, and
Stations-- The Ancient Entrance to these Vaults-- Tablet
Commemorative of the Visit of Napoleon I.-- Millions of Bottles of
Champagne in Piles and Racks-- The Original Vaults known as
Siberia-- Scene in the Packing Hall-- Messrs. Moët and Chandon's
Large and Complete Staff-- Provision for Illness and Old Age--
Annual Fête Given by the Firm-- Their Famous "Star" Brand--
M. Perrier-Jouët, the lucky Grandson of a little Epernay Grocer--
His Offices and Cellars-- His Wine Classed according to its
Deserts-- Messrs. Roussillon and Co.'s Establishment-- The
Recognition accorded to their Wines-- Their Stock of Old Vintages--
The Extensive Establishment of Messrs. Pol Roger and Co.-- Their
Large Stock of the Fine 1874 Vintage-- Preparations for the Tirage--
Their Vast Fireproof Cellier and its Admirable Temperature-- Their
Lofty and Capacious Cellars of Two Stories.

Those magnates of the champagne trade, Messrs. Moët and Chandon, whose famous "star" brand is familiar in every part of the civilised globe, and whose half-score miles of cellars contain as many million bottles of champagne as there are millions of inhabitants in most of the secondary European states, have their head-quarters at Epernay in a spacious château--in that street of châteaux named the Rue du Commerce, but commonly known as the Faubourg de la Folie--which is approached through handsome iron gates, and has beautiful gardens in the rear extending in the direction of the River Marne. The existing firm dates from the year 1833, but the family of Moët--conjectured to have originally come from the Low Countries--had already been associated with the champagne wine trade for well-nigh a century previously. If the Moëts came from Holland they must have established themselves in the Champagne at a very early date, for the annals of Reims record that in the fifteenth century Jean and Nicolas Moët were _échevins_ of the city. A Moët was present in that capacity at the coronation of Charles VII. in 1429, when Joan of Arc stood erect by the principal altar of the cathedral with her sacred banner in her hand, and for having contributed to repulse an attempt on the part of the English to prevent the entrance of the Royal party into the city, the Moëts were subsequently ennobled by the same monarch. A mural tablet in the church of St. Remi records the death of D. G. Moët, Grand Prior, in 1554, and nine years later we find Nicol Moët claiming exemption at Epernay from the payment of _tailles_ on the ground of his being a noble. An old commercial book preserved in the family archives shows that in the year 1743--at the epoch when the rashness of the Duc de Grammont saved the English army under George II. from being cut to pieces at Dettingen--a descendant of the foregoing, one Claude Louis Nicolas Moët, who owned considerable vineyard property in the vicinity of Epernay, decided upon embarking in the wine trade. It is his son, however, Jean Remi Moët, born in 1758, who may be looked upon as the veritable founder of the present commerce in Champagne wines, which, thanks to his efforts, received a wonderful impulse, so that instead of the consumption of the vintages of the Marne being limited as heretofore to the privileged few, it spread all over the civilised world.

At Messrs. Moët and Chandon's we had the opportunity of inspecting some of the old account-books of the firm, and more particularly those recording the transactions of Jean Remi Moët and his father. The first sales of sparkling wine, on May 23rd, 1743, comprised 301 bottles of the vintage of 1741 to Pierre Joly, wine-merchant, _bon des douze chez le Roi_, whatever that may mean, at Paris; 120 bottles to Pierre Gabriel Baudoin, also _bon des douze_, at Paris; and a similar quantity to the Sieur Compoin, keeping the "hotellerie ditte la pestitte Escurie," Rue du Port Maillart, at Nantes in Brittany. The entry specifies that the wine for Nantes is to be left at Choisy-le-Roi, and taken by land to Orleans by the carters of that town, who are to be found at the Ecu d'Orléans, Porte St. Michel, Paris, the carriage as far as Choisy being 4 livres 10 deniers (about 4 francs) for the two half-baskets, and to Paris 3 livres 15 deniers the basket.

Between 1750 and '60, parcels of wine were despatched to Warsaw, Vienna, Berlin, Königsberg, Dantzig, Stettin, Brussels, and Amsterdam; but one found no mention of any sales to England till the year 1788, when the customers of the firm included "Milord" Farnham, of London, and Messrs. Felix Calvert and Sylvin, who had a couple of sample bottles sent to them, for which they were charged five shillings. In the same year Messrs. Carbonnell, Moody, and Walker (predecessors of the well-known existing firm of Carbonnell and Co.) wrote in French for two baskets, of ten dozens each, of _vin de champagne_ "of good body, not too charged with liqueur, but of excellent taste, and _not at all sparkling_!" while the Chevalier Colebrook, writing from Bath, requests that 72 bottles of champagne may be sent to his friend the Hon. John Butler, Molesworth Street, Dublin, "who if contented with the wine will become a good customer, 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-merchants of the same name carrying on business to-day, and whom the Moëts 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. Moët despatches a traveller to England named Jeanson, and his letters, some two hundred in number, are all preserved in the archives of the house. On the 17th May, 1790, he writes from London as follows:--"As yet I have only gone on preparatory and often useless errands. I have distributed samples of which I have no news. Patience is necessary, and I endeavour to provide myself with it. How the taste of this country has changed since ten years ago! Almost everywhere 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, at M. Macnamara's. We shall uncork four bottles of our wine, which will probably be all right." In May, 1792, Jean Remi Moët 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 inaugurated, we find the accounts in the ledger opened to this or the other "citoyen." The orthodox Republican formula, however, did not long continue, and "sieur" and "monsieur" resumed their accustomed places, showing that Jean Remi Moët had no sympathy with the Jacobin faction of the day. In 1805 he became Mayor of Epernay, and between this time and the fall of the Empire received Napoleon several times at his residence, as well as the Empress Josephine and the King of Westphalia. The Emperor, after recapturing Reims from the Allies, came on to Epernay, on which occasion he presented M. Moët with the cross of the Legion of Honour. In 1830 the latter was arbitrarily dismissed from his mayoralty by Charles X., but was speedily reinstated by Louis Philippe, though he did not retain his office for long, his advanced age compelling him to retire from active life in the course of 1833. At this epoch the firm, which, since 1807 had been known as Moët and Co., was remodelled under the style of Moët and Chandon, the two partners being M. Victor Moët, son of the outgoing partner, and M. P. G. Chandon, the descendant of an old ennobled family of the Mâconnais, who had married M. Jean Remi Moët's eldest daughter. The descendants of these gentlemen are to-day at the head of the business, the partners being on the one hand M. Victor Moët-Romont and M. C. J. V. Auban Moët-Romont; and on the other, MM. Paul and Raoul Chandon de Briailles.

Facing Messrs. Moët and Chandon's offices at Epernay is a range of comparatively new buildings, with its white façade ornamented with the well-known monogram M. and C., surmounted by the familiar star. It is here that the business of blending and bottling the wine is carried on. Passing through the arched gateway access is obtained to a spacious courtyard, where carts laden with bottles are being expeditiously lightened of their fragile contents by the busy hands of numerous workmen. Another gateway on the left leads into the spacious bottle-washing room, which from the middle of May until the middle of July presents a scene of extraordinary animation. Bottle-washing apparatus, supplied by a steam-engine with 20,000 gallons of water per diem, are ranged in fifteen rows down the entire length of this hall, and nearly 200 women strive to excel each other in diligence and celerity in their management, a practised hand washing from 900 to 1,000 bottles in the course of the day. To the right of this _salle de rinçage_, as it is styled, bottles are stacked in their tens of thousands, and lads furnished with barrows, known as _diables_, hurry to and fro, conveying these to the washers, or removing the clean bottles to the adjacent courtyard, where they are allowed to drain, prior to being taken to the _salle de tirage_ or bottling room.

Before, however, the washing of bottles on this gigantic scale commences, the "marrying" or blending of the wine is accomplished in a vast apartment, 250 feet in length and 100 feet broad, during the early spring. The casks of newly-vintaged wine which have been stowed away during the winter months, in the extensive range of cellars hewn out of the chalk underlying Epernay, where they have slowly fermented, are mixed together in due proportions in huge vats, each holding upwards of 12,000 gallons. Some of this wine is the growth of Messrs. Moët and Chandon's own vineyards, of which they possess as many as 900 acres (giving constant employment to 800 labourers and vinedressers) at Ay, Avenay, Bouzy, Cramant, Champillon, Chouilly, Dizy, Epernay, Grauves, Hautvillers, Le Mesnil, Moussy, Pierry, Saran, St. Martin, Verzy, and Verzenay, and the average annual cost of cultivating which is about £40 per acre. At Ay the firm own 210 acres of vineyards; at Cramant and Chouilly, nearly 180 acres; at Verzy and Verzenay, 120 acres; at Pierry and Grauves, upwards of 100 acres; at Hautvillers, 90 acres; at Le Mesnil, 80 acres; at Epernay, nearly 60 acres; and at Bouzy, 55 acres. Messrs. Moët and Chandon, moreover, possess vendangeoirs, or pressing-houses, at Ay, Bouzy, Cramant, Epernay, Hautvillers, Le Mesnil, Pierry, Saran, and Verzenay, in which the large number of 40 presses are installed. At these vendangeoirs no less than 5,450 pièces of fine white wine, sufficient for 1,360,000 bottles of champagne, are annually made--that is, 1,200 pièces at Ay, 1,100 at Cramant and Saran, 800 at Verzy and Verzenay, and smaller quantities at the remaining establishments. All these establishments have their celliers and their cellars, together with cottages for the accommodation of the numerous vinedressers in the employment of the firm.

Extensive as are the vineyards owned by Messrs. Moët and Chandon, the yield from them is utterly inadequate to the enormous demand which the great Epernay firm are annually called upon to supply, and large purchases have to be made by their agents from the growers throughout the Champagne. The wine thus secured, as well as that grown by the firm, is duly mixed together in such proportions as will ensure lightness with the requisite vinosity, and fragrance combined with effervescence, a thorough amalgamation being effected by stirring up the wine with long poles provided with fan-shaped ends. If the vintage be indifferent in quality the firm have scores of huge tuns filled with the yield of more favoured seasons to fall back upon to ensure any deficiencies of character and flavour being supplied.

The casks of wine to be blended are raised from the cellars, half a dozen at a time, by means of a lift provided with an endless chain, and worked by the steam-engine of which we have already spoken. They are emptied, through traps in the floor of the room above, into the huge vats which, standing upon a raised platform, reach almost to the ceiling. From these vats the fluid is allowed to flow through hose into rows of casks stationed below. Before being bottled the wine reposes for a certain time, is next duly racked and again blended, and is eventually conveyed through silver-plated pipes into oblong reservoirs, each fitted with a dozen syphon-taps, so arranged that directly the bottle slipped on to one of them becomes full the wine ceases to flow.

Upwards of 200 workpeople are employed in the _salle de tirage_ at Messrs. Moët and Chandon's, which, while the operation of bottling is going on, presents a scene of bewildering activity. Men and lads are gathered round the syphon-taps briskly removing the bottles as they become filled, and supplanting them by empty ones. Other lads hasten to transport the filled bottles on trucks to the corkers, whose so-called "guillotine" machines send the corks home with a sudden thud. The corks being secured with _agrafes_ the bottles are placed in large flat baskets called _manettes_, and wheeled away on tracks, the quarts being deposited in the cellars by means of lifts, while the pints slide down an inclined plane by the aid of an endless chain, which raises the trucks with the empty baskets at the same time the full ones make their descent into the cellars. What with the incessant thud of the corking machines, the continual rolling of iron-wheeled trucks over the concrete floor, the rattling and creaking of the machinery working the lifts, the occasional sharp report of a bursting bottle, and the loudly-shouted orders of the foremen, who display the national partiality for making a noise to perfection, the din becomes at times all but unbearable. The number of bottles filled in the course of the day naturally varies, still Messrs. Moët and Chandon reckon that during the month of June a daily average of 100,000 are taken in the morning from the stacks in the _salle de rinçage_, washed, dried, filled, corked, wired, lowered into the cellars and carefully arranged in symmetrical order. This represents a total of two and a half million bottles during that month alone.

The bottles on being lowered into the cellars, either by means of the incline or the lifts, are placed in a horizontal position, and with their uppermost side daubed with white chalk, are stacked in layers from two to half-a-dozen bottles deep with narrow oak laths between. The stacks are usually about six or seven feet high and 100 feet and upwards in length. Whilst the wine is thus reposing in a temperature of about 55° Fahrenheit, fermentation sets in, and the ensuing month is one of much anxiety. Thanks, however, to the care bestowed, Messrs. Moët and Chandon's annual loss from bottles bursting rarely exceeds three per cent., though fifteen was once regarded as a respectable and satisfactory average. The broken glass is a perquisite of the workmen, the money arising from its sale, which at the last distribution amounted to no less than 20,000 francs, being divided amongst them every couple of years.

The usual entrance to Messrs. Moët and Chandon's Epernay cellars--which, burrowed out in all directions, are of the aggregate length of nearly seven miles, and have usually between 11,000,000 and 12,000,000 bottles and 25,000 casks of wine stored therein--is through a wide and imposing portal, and down a long and broad flight of steps. It is, however, by the ancient and less imposing entrance, through which more than one crowned head has condescended to pass, that we set forth on our lengthened tour through these intricate underground galleries--this subterranean city with its miles of streets, crossroads, open spaces, tramways, and stations devoted solely to champagne. A gilt inscription on a black marble tablet testifies that "on the 26th July, 1807, Napoleon the Great, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, and Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, honoured commerce by visiting the cellars of Jean Rémi Moët, Mayor of Epernay, President of the Canton, and Member of the General Council of the Department," within three weeks of the signature of the treaty of Tilsit. Passing down the flight of steep slippery steps traversed by the victor of Eylau and Jena, access is gained to the upper range of vaults, brilliantly illuminated by the glare of gas, or dimly lighted by the flickering flame of tallow-candles, upwards of 60,000lbs. of which are annually consumed. Here group after group of the small army of 350 workmen employed in these subterranean galleries are encountered engaged in the process of transforming the _vin brut_ into champagne. At Messrs. Moët and Chandon's the all-important operation of liqueuring the wine is effected by aid of machines of the latest construction, which regulate the quantity administered to the utmost nicety. The corks are branded by being pressed against steel dies heated by gas, by women who can turn out 3,000 per day apiece, the quantity of string used to secure them amounting to nearly ten tons in the course of the year.

There is another and a lower depth of cellars to be explored to which access is gained by trapholes in the floor--through which the barrels and baskets of wine are raised and lowered--and by flights of steps. From the foot of the latter there extends an endless vista of lofty and spacious passages hewn out of the chalk, the walls of which, smooth as finished masonry, are lined with thousands of casks of raw wine, varied at intervals by gigantic vats. Miles of long, dark-brown, dampish-looking galleries stretch away to the right and left, and though devoid of the picturesque festoons of fungi which decorate the London Dock vaults, exhibit a sufficient degree of mouldiness to give them an air of respectable antiquity. These multitudinous galleries, lit up by petroleum-lamps, are mostly lined with wine in bottles stacked in compact masses to a height of six or seven feet, only room enough for a single person to pass being left. Millions of bottles are thus arranged, the majority on their sides, in huge piles, with tablets hung up against each stack to note its age and quality; and the rest, which are undergoing daily evolutions at the hands of the twister, at various angles of inclination. In these cellars there are nearly 11,000 racks in which the bottles of _vin brut_ rest _sur pointe_, as many as 600,000 bottles being commonly twisted daily.

The way runs on between regiments of bottles of the same size and shape, save where at intervals pints take the place of quarts; and the visitor, gazing into the black depths of the transverse passages to the right and left, becomes conscious of a feeling that if his guide were suddenly to desert him he would feel as hopelessly lost as in the catacombs of Rome. There are two galleries, each 650 feet in length, containing about 650,000 bottles, and connected by 32 transverse galleries, with an aggregate length of 4,000 feet, in which nearly 1,500,000 bottles are stored. There are, further, eight galleries, each 500 feet in length, and proportionably stocked; also the extensive new vaults, excavated some five or six years back, in the rear of the then-existing cellarage, and a considerable number of smaller vaults. The different depths and varying degrees of moisture afford a choice of temperature of which the experienced owners know how to take advantage. The original vaults, wherein more than a century ago the first bottles of champagne made by the infant firm were stowed away, bear the name of Siberia, on account of their exceeding coldness. This section consists of several roughly-excavated low winding galleries, resembling natural caverns, and affording a striking contrast to the broad, lofty, and regular-shaped corridors of more recent date.

When the proper period arrives for the bottles to emerge once more into the upper air they are conveyed to the packing-room, a spacious hall 180 feet long and 60 feet broad. In front of its three large double doors waggons are drawn up ready to receive their loads. The seventy men and women employed here easily foil, label, wrap, and pack up some 10,000 bottles a day. Cases and baskets are stacked in different parts of this vast hall, at one end of which numerous trusses of straw used in the packing are piled. Seated at tables ranged along one side of the apartment women are busily occupied in pasting on labels or encasing the necks of bottles in gold or silver foil, whilst elsewhere men, seated on three-legged stools in front of smoking caldrons of molten sealing-wax of a deep green hue, are coating the necks of other bottles by plunging them into the boiling fluid. When labelled and decorated with either wax or foil the bottles pass on to other women, who swathe them in pink tissue-paper and set them aside for the packers, by whom, after being deftly wrapped round with straw, they are consigned to baskets or cases, to secure which last no less than 10,000lbs. of nails are annually used. England and Russia are partial to gold foil, pink paper, and wooden cases holding a dozen or a couple of dozen bottles of the exhilarating fluid, whereas other nations prefer waxed necks, disdain pink paper, and insist on being supplied in wicker baskets containing fifty bottles each.

Some idea of the complex character of so vast an establishment as that of Messrs. Moët and Chandon may be gathered from a mere enumeration of their staff, which, in addition to twenty clerks and 350 cellarmen proper, includes numerous agrafe-makers and corkcutters, packers and carters, wheelwrights and saddlers, carpenters, masons, slaters and tilers, tinmen, firemen, needlewomen, &c., while the inventory of objects used by this formidable array of workpeople comprises no fewer than 1,500 distinct heads. A medical man attached to the establishment gives gratuitous advice to all those employed, and a chemist dispenses drugs and medicines without charge. While suffering from illness the men receive half-pay, but should they be laid up by an accident met with in the course of their work full salary is invariably awarded to them. As may be supposed, so vast an establishment as this is not without a provision for those past work, and all the old hands receive liberal pensions from the firm upon retiring. Every year Messrs. Moët and Chandon give a banquet or a ball to the people in their employ--usually after the bottling of the wine is completed--when the hall in which the entertainment takes place is handsomely decorated and illuminated with myriads of coloured lamps.

It is needless to particularise Messrs. Moët and Chandon's wines, which are familiar to all drinkers of champagne. Their famous "star" brand is known in all societies, figures equally at clubs and mess-tables, at garden parties and picnics, dinners and _soirées_, and has its place in hotel _cartes_ all over the world. One of the best proofs of the wine's universal popularity is found in the circumstance that as many as 1,000 visitors from all parts of the world come annually to Epernay and make the tour of Messrs. Moët and Chandon's spacious cellars.