resting-place of the deity when he came to taste the Rhine grapes,
and set an example to all future tipplers. It would not have been out
of place to call the Rhine the country of Bacchus. The Rhine,
Moselle, Neckar, and Main are gardens of the vine; but the Germans
have not been content with cultivating the banks of rivers alone, for
the higher lands are planted as well. From Bonn to Coblenz, and from
the latter city to Mayence, the country is covered with vineyards.
The Johannisberger of "father" Rhine, the Gruenhauser or the
Brauneberger of the Moselle, and the Hochheimer of the Main, each
distinguish and hallow their respective rivers in the eyes of the
connoisseur in wine.

The vineyards of the Rhine are a scene of surpassing beauty; Erbach,
enthroned among its vines; Johannisberg, seated on a crescent hill of
red soil, adorned with cheering vegetation; Mittelheim, Geisenheim,
and Ruedesheim with its strong, fine-bodied wine, the grapes from
which bask on their promontory of rock, in the summer sun, and imbibe
its generous heat from dawn to setting; then again, on the other
side, Bingen, delightful, sober, majestic, with its terraces of
vines, topped by the chateau of Klopp. The river and its riches, the
corn and fruit which the vicinity produces, all remind the stranger
of a second Canaan. The Bingerloch, the ruins, and the never-failing
vines scattered among them, like verdant youth revelling amid age and
decay, give a picture nowhere else exhibited, uniting to the
joyousness of wine the sober tinge of meditative feeling. The hills
back the picture, covered with feudal relics or monastic remains,
mingled with the purple grape. Landscapes of greater beauty, joined
to the luxuriance of fruitful vine culture, can nowhere be seen.

The glorious season of fruition--the _Vintage_--is the time for the
visit of a wine-lover to the Rhine. It does not take place until the
grapes are perfectly mature; they are then carefully gathered, and
the bad fruit picked out, and, with the stalks, put aside. The wine
of the pressing is separated, _most vom ersten druck, vom nachdruck_.
The more celebrated of the wines are all fermented in casks; and
then, after being repeatedly racked, suffered to remain for years in
large _fudders_ of 250 gallons, to acquire perfection by time. The
wines mellow best in large vessels; hence the celebrated Heidelberg
tun, thirty-one feet long by twenty-one high, and holding one hundred
and fifty _fudde