The works of Horace : with English notes, critical and ... - Cristo Raul

696 EXCURSUS VI. VAElEtlES OP ANCIENT WINES.
drinking, and would seldom endure longer than from one vintage to an-
other, but lit good seaaona tbfly would sometimes be found capable of
being preserved beyond the yeai*. Of tliis desci^ption We may suppose
that Sabine wine to have been which Horace calls upon liia friend to
broach when four years dld,i although in general the proper age of the Sabinum
was from seven to fifteen years ; and the poet has abundantly
shown, in other parts of his works, that he knev^ how to value old wine,
and was seldom content with it so young. The sta-onger dark-colored
wine^ when lontg kept, underiVent a species of decohi position [cariem
vetustaiis), front the precipitation of part of the estract-ive matter which
they contained. This, and the pungency {aevuien) which such wines ac-
quired, were justly esteemed the proofs of their having arrived at their
due age. The genuine flavor of the vintage was then fully developed,
and all the roughness of its early condition was removed. From the mode,
I;owever, in which the ancient wines were preserved, a greater or less in
spissation took place, and, if we i&ay depend oil the statement of Flinyr
this was most observable in the more generous kinds, and the taste be
came disagreeably bitter, obscuring the true flavor of the liquor. Wine
of a middle age was therefore to be preferred, as being the itiost whole
some and grateful \^ bat in those days, as well as ours; it was the fashion
to place the highest value on whatever was rarest, and an extravagant
sum was often given for wines which were literally not drinkable. Such
seems to have been the case with the famous vintage of the year in which
L. Opimius NepbS was consul^ being: the 633d from' the foundation of tha
city, W'hen, from the great warmth of the summer, all the productions of
the earth attained an uncommon degree of perfection. Velleius Paterca-
ins, who flourished 150 years afterward, denies that any of 'it was to bo)
had in his time ;^ but both Fliny and Martial, who Were considerably posterior
to that historian, describe it as still inexbausted at the time when
they wrote. The former, indeed, admits that it was then reduced to the
consistence of hoiley, and conld only be used in small quantities for flavoring
other wiiles, or mixing with water.* Reckoning the original price to
hard beefi one hundred numrai, or sixteen shillings and sixpence for the
amphorai he calcuIat€iE( that, actwr'ding to the usiial rate of !Eloman inter
est^i a single onnce of this wine, at the timd of the third consulate of Ca^°
ligula, when it had reached its 160th Jrear, must have cost lit least oner
fiummus, 6t twojt&titQt which would make the price of the quart amount
to AiX shiUiugs-and sixpence English;'
As the ordinary Wiiies of Italy wei'e ptodnCed in* gfeat abundance, they
Were often sold at very moderate prices; Oolumefla'ff reduced estimate
would make the cost about fourptfricie per gallon ; but we; find firomi Pliny
that, When Licinius Crassus atnd Julias Omaut Were consuls, on edict was
issued by them, prohibitirig the sale of Ofeefk and Aminean Wiiie fof eight
ases the amphofa, which Would be less than one peilny a gallon ; and thd
same author asserts, on the authority of Varro, that, at the time of Metel
lus's triumph, the congiust a somewhat smaller measure than our gallon,
was to be bought for a single as, or about three farthings English, With
these very low prices, boweVer, it is not easy to reconcile the statement
L Carm., i., 9, 7. 2, Hist Nat, xxiii., 1.
3. Hiet Rom., ii., 7. 4. Hist. Nat xlv, <
5. Langioith^a Observations on Arbutl Tables of AMcient Coins, &c., p. 37