the
present generation. Claret, I understand from experts, will never be
produced, but hermitages and wines of that type will be made in the
course of ten or twenty years which will be able to compete in the
European markets; long before this they should become useful for blending
with French and Spanish 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. One great difficulty which militates against
the reputation of Australian wine, is that of the untrustworthiness of
all but a few brands. Of course all vintages from the same grapes differ,
but there is a margin of difference beyond which a wine may not go, and
with many an Australian _vigneron_ this margin is frequently passed,
owing to carelessness or inexperience in manufacture. Another drawback is
the difficulty of procuring all but the most immature wine. Nearly the
whole of each vintage is drunk within twelve months after it is made.
That Australian wines will ever compete with the famous French _crus_ I
should very much doubt, but that they will in the course of the next
twenty years gradually supersede with advantage a great deal of the
manufactured stuff now drunk in England is more than probable. At present
the prices are too high for Australian wines to find any large market at
home. Although it is of course an exceptional case, there is an Adelaide
madeira which fetches as much as 63s. per dozen within two miles of the
vineyard. Nothing now obtainable in Australia under 15s. a dozen would be
worth sending home, and by the time freight and duty is added to that,
the London price would be considerable.

I have already made allusion to that peculiar phase of Australian
life--nobblerising; but, if I am not mistaken, the impression left on
your mind will be that the nobbler is either of aristocratic champagne or
plebeian beer. But there are two other liquids--whisky and brandy--which
play an important part in nobblerising. The quantity of spirits drunk in
Australia is appalling. Whisky is the favourite spirit, then brandy, and
rarely Schiedam, schnapps, or gin. And what about drunkenness?
Statistically it is not very much worse than in England, but the
difference lies in the class who get drunk. Here it is not merely the
lower clas