“I suppose,” I said, “that the quota has been reached in the case of Henry VIII, Elizabeth, and the prominent American financiers, such as Rockefeller, Morgan, etc.”
“It would cost you five hundred dollars to publish a book on any royal Englishman, dead or alive,” said Rumsonby. “As for American men of business, the only one who hasn’t had a biography written about him is Herbert S. Kingsley, president of the Eighth Avenue Bank of Ogdensburg, New York. You want him?”
“No,” I said.
“Somebody’ll pick up him before the week’s out,” said Rumsonby. The phone on his desk rang and he took up the receiver. “Bureau for the Prohibition of Biographies,” he said, in a singsong voice. “Who? Lieutenant-Colonel George Babcock? Wait a minute. Hold on now. Is that Lieutenant-Colonel George Babcock of the Thirty-first Mississippi? Sorry, he’s been done. By a Mrs. Ann Meadows, of St. Martin’s Parish, Louisiana.” Rumsonby hung up.
“Is anything being done to stop the glut of novels?” I asked.
“There’s some talk,” said my friend, “of a federal statute restricting novels about little groups of people going to pieces through drinking and carousing around with each other’s mates. Geographical allocation of such groups has been suggested as the best means of regulation. For instance, since 1932 there have been upwards of four thousand novels dealing with groups of people going to pieces in Long Island, Manhattan, and the Riviera alone. They’d have to do it somewhere else, with a limit on the number of books to a given region.”
“Sounds like something Congress would enjoy,” I said. “Now, listen. Suppose a character in a novel suddenly began telling the life of Lincoln and told it all?”
“There’s a case like that up before the Supreme Court now,” said Rumsonby. “Fellow has brought out a book in which a little group of people go to pieces in Miami, Florida, and one of them, at a wild party, tells a new life of General P. G. T. Beauregard. The penalty for a life of Beauregard is sixteen hundred dollars and sixty days’ imprisonment or both. It’s up to the Supreme Court.”
How to Tell a Fine Old Wine
In spite of all that has been written about wines, the confusion in the minds of some lay drinkers is just as foggy as it was—in the case of some minds, even foggier. The main trouble, I think, is that the average wine connoisseur has suddenly become rather more the writing man than the sipping man without possessing that fine precision in expository composition which comes only from long years of writing, rewriting, cutting down, and, most especially, throwing away. It is my hope in this article, somehow or other, to clear up a few of the more involved problems of nomenclature and of geographical (or viticultural) distribution, for I believe I know what the wine experts have been trying to say and I believe I can say it perhaps a little more clearly.
France, then, is divided into ninety different Départements, all but four of them ending in “et-Oise” (and-Oise) and twenty-seven of them having towns named Châlons. Fortunately, in only three of the Châ-lons communes are there girondes where any of the great wines of France are grown. We can safely confine ourselves to the Bordeaux region and the Burgundy region, respectively the Côte-d’Or and the Côte de Châlons, or as the French trainmen say, “L’autre côté!” The great wines of France are divided into only three classifications with which we need to be concerned: the grands vins, the petits vins, and the vins fins. And it is with the last that we shall be most particularly concerned. Vins fins means, simply enough, “finished wines,” that is, wines which did not turn out as well as might have been expected.
It is these wines and none others which America is getting today and which America is going to continue to get. Just what causes this I don’t exactly know, but something.
In the old days of the great châteauxiers, there was never any question about what to do with a vin when it turned out to be fin. The châteauxiers simply referred to it philosophically as “fin de siècle” (finished for good) and threw it out. They would have nothing to do with a wine that wasn’t noble, distinguished, dignified, courageous, high-souled, and austere. Nowadays it is different. The vins fins are filtered through to the American public in a thousand different disguises, all spurious—not a genuine disguise among them. It is virtually impossible for the layman, when he picks up a bottle labelled “St. Julien-Clos Vougeot-Grandes Veuves, 1465A21, mise du château, Perdolio, Premier Cru, Marchanderie: Carton et Cie., 1924,” to know whether he is getting, as should be the case with this label, a truly noble St. Estèphe or, as is more likely to be the case, a Benicarló that has been blended with Heaven only knows what, perhaps even a white Margelaise! Well then, how is he to know?
Let us say that a bottle has come into our hands labelled as above. “St. Julien” is simply the name of the commune and “Clos Vougeot” the name of the château around which the grapes are grown. “Grandes Veuves” is either an added distinguishing flourish put on the noble old label years and years ago by some grandes veuves (large widows) or it is a meaningless addition placed thereon since repeal by those French flâneurs who hope to inveigle the American public into buying cheap and tawdry wines under elaborate and impressive-sounding labels. So much for the name of the wine itself.
The number, 1465A21, is nothing to be bewildered by. It is simply the official estampe française de la douane and it can be checked against the authentic “serial-running” of the official French revenue stamping machine by applying to somebody in the French Embassy here, or the French Consulate, and asking him to get in touch with the man in charge of the registered files of the French revenue stamping department. If the letter used (in this case “A”) proves to be the actual letter employed in 1924 by the revenue stampers, the vintage date on the bottle is authentic, providing, of course, that the identifying letter was, in that year, inserted between the fourth and fifth figures of the serial number and that 146521 fell among the estampages allocated to the St. Julien commune in that year. It is, of course, unfortunate that the Stavisky affair in France threw all the numbers in that country into the wildest sort of confusion, so that it is hardly likely that any stamp numbers can be certified with confidence by anybody for the next six months or so. But the wine will be all the better after six months and France may by then have its records in order once more, if she can find them.
The phrase “mise du château” is extremely simple, and it is astonishing how many Americans are puzzled by it. It means nothing more than “mice in the château,” just as it says. The expression goes back to the days, some twenty years ago, when certain French manufacturers of popular “tonic wines” made fortunes almost overnight and in many cases bought up old châteaux, tore them down, and built lavish new ones in the rococo manner. These new châteaux were, of course, clean and well kept, but so garish and ugly that a disdainful expression grew up among the French peasantry in regard to them: “Ils n’ont jamais de mise du château là-bas” (“They never have any mice in that château over there”). The grand old châteauxiers thereupon began to add to their labels, “mise du château”—in other words, “There are mice in this château,” a proud if slightly incongruous legend for a bottle of noble old wine.
The label symbol “Perdolio” on our bottle might equally well have been “Manfreda,” “Variola,” “Muscatel,” “Amontillado,” “Sauternes,” “Katerina,” or any one of a couple of hundred others. The idea of this name originated with the old Spanish vinteriosos, especially those of Casanovia and Valencia, and indicated simply a desire on the part of a given merchant to place the name of a favorite daughter, son, mistress, or wine on the bottles he merchandised.
“Premier Cru,” which we come to next in looking back at our St. Julien label, means “first growth,” that is, wine that was grown first. And “Marchanderie: Carton et Cie.” is the name of the shipper. In some cases the name of the captain of the ship transporting the wine is also added to the label, some such name as Graves or Médoc, and one need not take alarm at this, but one should be instantly suspicious of any
marks, names, numbers, or symbols other than those I have gone into here. Bottles which bear such legends as “George H., Kansas City, ‘24” or “C. M. & Bessie B., ‘18” or “Mrs. P. P. Bliss, Ashtabula, O., ‘84” or “I Love My Wife But Oh You Kid (1908)” may be put down as having fallen into the hands of American tourists somewhere between the bottling and the shipping. They are doubtlessly refills containing a colored sugar water, if anything at all.
The vintage year is, of course, always branded into the cork of the bottle and is the only kind of bottle-cork date mark to go by. Dates laid in with mother-of-pearl or anything of the sort are simply impressive and invidious attempts to force high prices from the pockets of gullible Americans. So also are French wine labels bearing the American flag or portraits of Washington or such inscriptions, no matter how beautifully engraved or colored, as “Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean” and “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Grew.”
In summing up, it is perhaps advisable to say a few words about the vineyards themselves. Some vineyards, facing north, get the morning sun just under the right side of the leaf; others, facing south, get the sun on the other side. Many vineyards slope and many others do not. Once in a while one straggles into a graveyard or climbs up on a porch. In each case a difference may or may not be found in the quality of the wine. When a town has been built on the place where a vineyard formerly was, the vineyard is what the French call “out” (a word adopted from our English tennis term). There may be a few vines still producing in gutters and backyards of the town, but the quality of their output will be ignoble. The “out” taste is easily discernible to both the connoisseur and the layman just as is the faint flavor of saddle polish in certain brands of sparkling Burgundy. In the main, it is safe to go by one’s taste. Don’t let anybody tell you it is one-tenth as hard to tell the taste of a good wine from the taste of a bad wine or even of a so-so wine as some of the connaisseurs écrivants would have us believe.
What Price a Farewell to Designs?
Ten years ago, when I was just a little shaver (shaving every other day, instead of simply letting the whole thing go, as I do now), almost every other article that appeared in any periodical you might pick up, from the New York Times Sunday Magazine to Gentlemen’s Needlework, was entitled What Price This or What Price That: “What Price Peace?” “What Price Farm Relief?” “What Price Naval Oil Reserves?” “What Price Prohibition in Norway?” “What Price Preservation of President Monroe’s Old Prince Street House?” “What Price U.S. Senator Grisbaum, the Man and the Public Servant?”
This went on for several years. Then came the “A Farewell to” epoch: “A Farewell to Prosperity,” “A Farewell to Religion,” “A Farewell to Happiness,” “A Farewell to Romance,” “A Farewell to Love,” “A Farewell to Peace,” “A Farewell to Security,” “A Farewell to Loyalty,” “A Farewell to Honor,” “A Farewell to Happy Days,” “A Farewell to President Monroe’s Old Prince Street House,” “A Farewell to Senator Grisbaum, the Man and the Public Servant.” (During this melancholy period there was some slight vogue for “A Preface to” titles, but this never really took hold for the reason that people were much more interested in kissing things goodbye than in being introduced to things.)
This went on for several years. Then, this winter, came (and if it were a snake, it would bite you) the “Design for” era. This will go on for several years: “Design for Leaving,” “Design for Loving,” “Design for Luring,” “Design for Laughing,” “Design for Lifting,” “Design for Lowering,” “Design for Lying,” “Design for Looping,” “Design for Loafing,” “Design for Loping,” “Design for Leaping,” “Design for Limping,” “Design for Preserving President Monroe’s Old Prince Street House,” etc.
Each of these title patterns could be shown to express the public temper of its time. A graph, indeed, could be worked out representing the mental attitude of the nation during the periods involved, but it would probably be left lying around and get thrown out by the cook. Suffice it, then, simply to point out that in the “What Price” days people were interested in what was going to come of everything; in the “Farewell to” days, they were apathetic about what became of anything; in the present “Design for” days, they are evincing a slight revival of interest in planning for the future. This set of conclusions, admittedly specious, is not, however, the main point I wish to make. What has interested me mostly in my researches (which involved going back over the files of everything, from 1880 to 1923) is that I found no title patterns at all comparable to the “What Price,” “A Farewell to,” and “Design for” phenomena. The only conclusion I could come to is that, although there were popular and famous titles of books and plays in the old days, they didn’t seem to lend themselves to paraphrase. Take, for example, “Beside the Bonny Brier Bush.” An article on the strategy of Lord Nelson could hardly have been entitled “Beside the Bonny Strategy of Lord Nelson.” It would have lacked ease. The same problem seems to have come up in the case of Clyde Fitch’s well-known play, “The Girl with the Green Eyes.” I encountered an article, printed at the time of that play’s popularity, called “Rabbit Trapping in the Western Reserve.” There had apparently been no effort to call it “The Girl with Rabbit Trapping in the Western Reserve” (although, of course, there was no way of being sure that there hadn’t been some effort). Similarly, “Little Lord Fauntleroy” failed to leave its imprint on the pages of forgotten periodicals; there was no “Little Lord Tariff Problems of Today,” no “Little Lord Alarming Increase of Scorching on the Public Highways.” This unadaptability held true also for “The Memoirs of U.S. Grant,” “Sherlock Holmes,” “Secret Service,” “Captain Jinks of the Horse Marines” (a specially notable instance), “Lucile,” “The Squaw Man,” etc.
I did not, it is only fair to admit, check all titles of books and plays with all titles of articles in the years between 1880 and 1923. If I had, this would have been a comprehensive and important article, maybe even a standard source article. The trouble was that I got to a point in my researches where I not only forgot what I was trying to prove but also what I was looking up. As a result, I spent one whole afternoon at the Public Library clipping pictures of navy officers and show girls out of back copies of Munsey’s. They do not fit anywhere into my design for grieving over a farewell to old-fashioned titles. But I found one swell Dewey.
The Literary Meet
The ladies’ literary society has come under the influence of the magazine Liberty, which has set a new vogue in Belles Lettres by announcing, before each article, the official reading time—for example: 14 minutes, 30 seconds. The gathering of the Wednesday Afternoon Browning Club is therefore known as a Meet, instead of a meeting. It was run off this week at the home of Mrs. Charles F. Turnbush, and was won by the Blues with a total point score of 36 1/2. The Red ladies finished with but 11 1/2. Previous to the matches, Mrs. Carl Dittledorf gave an exhibition against time, clipping 32 seconds off par for “Bishop Blougram’s Apology.”
The sprints this week were particularly interesting. W. E. Henley’s “Invictus” was won by Mrs. George Preen, of 247 Civic Park Drive, in 8 2/5 seconds, lowering by two-fifths of a second the previous mark, set two weeks ago by Mrs. Harry Leeper, of The Elms, Glenn Junction. Poe’s “To Helen” was also won by Mrs. Preen in the snappy time of 6 1/5 seconds, tying her own previous record of the second meet in August.
In the middle distances, the “Evangeline” of Longfellow was a particularly stirring event. It was won by Mrs. Katherine Murch, a house guest of Mrs. Turnbush, in 30 minutes and 26 seconds. This is a new world’s record. Mrs. Leeper, who finished in 30 minutes and 18 seconds, was disqualified for slurring her nouns.
The long-distance match this week was the reading of the New York Times editorial page for September 18. It was won by Mrs. Goldie Trinkham, the mother of two lovely children, in 1 hour, 14 minutes, and 7 seconds. Mrs. Preen, despite her fine work in the sprints, entered this competition also, but was forced to drop out at the bottom of the s
econd column. Mrs. Emma Giles, who led until the middle of the third column, was lapped when she went back and re-read a paragraph to get the sense of an editorial on the French budget.
The feature of the meet was “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” for the kiddies. Little Gretta Preen won this event in the time of 2 3/5 seconds. Little Miss Genevieve Leeper was disqualified for leaving out one twinkle. The ladies of the club are all giving one hour a day to literary work, this consisting largely of deep breathing exercises and other methods of increasing their reading scope.
“How is it possible, woman, in the awful and magnificent times we live in, to be preoccupied exclusively with the piddling?”
“I want to send that one about ‘Instead of hearts and cupid’s darts I’m sending you a wire,’ or whatever the hell it is!”
“The trouble is you make me think too much.”
“Well, I call it Caribbean, and I intend to go to my grave calling it Caribbean.”
“Hey, Joe. How d’ya spell ‘rhythm?”
Collecting Himself Page 11
