so calumniated as it latterly has been.

A word upon this subject.--I am a mortal enemy to every description of
humbug; and I believe there is as much in the medical world as in any
other. Madeira wine had for a century been in high and deserved
reputation, when on a sudden some fashionable physician discovers that
it contained more acid than sherry. Whether he was a sleeping partner
in some Spanish house, or whether he had received a present of a few
pipes of sherry, that he might turn the scale of public favour towards
that wine, I know not; but certain it is, that it became fashionable
with all medical gentlemen to prescribe sherry; and when once any thing
becomes fashionable, _c'est une affaire decide_.

I do not pretend to be much of a pathologist; but on reading Mr F---'s
analysis on the component parts of wine, I observed that in one hundred
parts there are perhaps twenty-two parts of acid in Madeira, and
nineteen in sherry; so that, in fact, if you reduce your glass of
Madeira wine, just _one sip_ in quantity, you will imbibe no more acid
than in a full glass of sherry; and when we consider the variety of
acids in sugar and other compounds, which abound in culinary
preparations, the fractional quantity upon which has been grounded the
abuse of Madeira wine, appears to be most ridiculous.

But if not a pathologist, I have a most decided knowledge of what is
good wine; and if the gout should some day honour me with a visit, I
shall at least have the consolation to know that I have by potation most
honestly _earned_ it.

But allowing that the medical gentlemen are correct, still their good
intentions are frustrated by the knavery of the world; and the result of
their prescriptions is, that people drink much more acid than they did
before. I do every justice to good old sherry when it does make its
appearance at table; it is a noble wine when aged and unsophisticated
from its youth; but for once that you meet with it genuine, you are
twenty times disappointed. When Madeira wine was in vogue, the island
could not produce the quantity required for consumption, and the vintage
from the north side of the island, or of Teneriffe, was substituted.
This adulteration no doubt was one cause of its losing its well
established reputation. But Madeira wine has a quality which in itself
proves its superiority over all other wines--namely, that although no
other wine can be passed off as Madeira, yet with Madeira the
win