rich village of the Rhinegau, situated about five miles from the city of Mentz, contains about 2500 inhabitants. The wine of this place is looked upon as without comparison the best of the Rhinegau, and consequently of all Germany. Baron Riesbeck says, he found it much more fiery than that of Hochheim; but that for pleasantness of taste there is no comparison between them. The best Rudesheim, like the best Hochheimer, sells upon the spot for three guilders the bottle. "You can (says our author) have no tolerable wine here for one guilder, nor any very good for two; at least I should prefer the worst Burgundy I ever tasted to any Rudesheimer I met with either here or at Mentz for these prices. Indeed the wine of our host (a rich ecclesiastic) was far better than any we could get at the inn. It stands to reason, that the same vintage furnishes grapes of very different degrees of goodness; but besides this, it is in the Rhinegau as everywhere else. The best wines are generally sent abroad by the poor and middling inhabitants, and the worst kept for internal consumption; for the expense of the carriage being the same in both cases, strangers had much rather pay a double price for the good than have the bad. It is only rich people, such as our host was, who can afford to keep the produce of their land for their own drinking. Upon this principle, I have eaten much better Swiss cheeses out of Switzerland than in it, and have drank much better Rhenish in the inns of the northern parts of Germany than in the country where the wine grows. The position of the country also contributes to render the wine dearer than it would otherwise be. As the best wine grows in its more northern parts, the easy transport by the Rhine to Holland, and all parts of the world, raises its price above its real value. The place where the flower of the Rudesheim wine grows is precisely the neck of the land, formed by the winding of the Rhine to the north, after it has run to the westward from Mentz hither. This neck, which is a rock almost perpendicular, enjoys the first rays of the rising and the last of the setting sun. It is divided into small low terraces, which are carried up to the utmost top of the hill like steep flairs; these are guarded by small walls and earthen mounds, which are often washed away by the rain. The first vine was brought hither from France, and they still call the best grape the Orleanais. They plant the vine stocks very low, scarce ever more than four or five feet high. This way of planting the vine is favourable to the production of a great deal of wine, but not to its goodness, as the phlegmatic and harsh parts of it would certainly evaporate more, if the sap was refined through higher and more numerous canals. This is undoubtedly the reason why every kind of Rhenish has something in it that is harsh, sour, and watery. The harvest of the best vineyards, which are the lower ones, in the above-mentioned neck of land, is often bought before-hand, at the advanced price of some ducats, by Dutch and other merchants. It must be a very rich stock to yield above four measures of wine.—You may easily imagine, that the cultivation of vineyards must be very expensive in this country, as the dung, which is extremely dear, must be carried up to the top of the mountains on the peasants shoulders."