III

TRUSTING that one has not wearied the reader unduly with these matters that have been discussed since leaving Mr. Gonzalez with a speculative eye on the wine trade of Jerez, we are now in a position to imagine exactly how the Founder of the firm of Gonzalez, Byass & Co. Ltd. first saw Jerez and the possibilities which the export of her already famous products offered.
    He was not long making up his mind, and the third of his journeys from Cadiz found him the owner of a little bodega near the old market place. It is quite clear that at this stage Mr. Gonzalez was merely "staking a claim" in Jerez, for there are no records of any transaction in the wine trade until a year or two later, and even after he had bought this bodega he continued to live and work in Cadiz.
    So far the impression may have been conveyed that young Gonzalez, in his zest for business, had little time for any lighter occupations. But this was far from being the case. His letters show that he was, as well, quite a romantic young man with a distinct penchant for the society of the opposite sex.
    Like many another penniless romantic, he chose to fall in love with the daughter of a rich man, the richest in Cadiz-Victorina de Soto. Everybody regarded the de Soto parents' consent to such a marriage as well-nigh an impossibility-everyone, that is to say, with the exception of the would-be husband.
    The story of his wooing is one of even slower and more strenuous achievement than the tale of his gradual ascension in the Sherry trade. Considering not only the opposition of the young lady's father and mother; but the strict surveillance kept on girls of; the de Soto rank at this period, one can hardly venture a guess as to how Gonzalez eventually gained the parental blessing. It has also to be remembered. that his delicate constitution did not particularly recommend his suit.
    His courtship was exciting as well as exacting, for he was several times soused with buckets of water by the servants, and on at least one occasion bitten by one of the fiercer watch-dogs in the de Soto ménage!
    But eventually the marriage took place, father de Soto probably consoling himself with the reflection that a son-in-law who showed such determination must either die young of cold water and dog-bites or eventually win some degree of worldly success,
    This was in the year 1833, and remembering the old proverb about a prophet's honour in his own country, Gonzalez decided that he would stand a better chance of success away from Cadiz, and it was at this time that he decided to throw all his energies and resources into the Sherry business.
    He now came with his wife to Jerez to live, taking a small house in the Calle Caballeros. It stood right opposite to the much grander establishment of Don Simon de la Sierra, a wry wealthy man and head of one of the most important wine houses in the town,
    It is interesting to notice that at this time, when Sherry was achieving such popularity abroad, the wine of Jerez was almost unknown to the Spaniards, except to those who lived in the district and drank the lighter varieties as a local beverage.
    Even as far back as the reign of Queen Elizabeth Sherry was highly regarded by Englishmen, and, as has already been said, Shakespeare many times referred to it under the names of "Sherris" and "Sherris Sack. "But it was in the spacious days of the latter part of the Georgian era that the wine really took a firm hold in England and elsewhere, and it was at this period that Mr. Gonzalez was beginning his career as a Sherry shipper.
    Conversely, though the Manzanillas and Finos were the wines liked by the local residents of all classes, these types were unknown abroad, and all wines shipped to England were of the generous types which we should now call Oloroso and Dessert Sherries.
    In the year 1835 Mr. M. M. Gonzalez actually established his business by shipping to England ten butts of Sherry. Owing to its persistent popularity, Sherry of the best qualities has not increased so much in price over the last century as some critics of the trade would like us to believe. The average price of this wine per butt was at least £50.
    A turnover of £500 per annum (not a profit) does not strike one as much of an achievement, but fortunately, in view of the enormous strength of his well-established rivals, Gonzalez found in this first small success a conviction that the Sherry business presented greater possibilities than any other that he had so far come into contact with.
   

Part of the old bodegas, showing casks from the Duke of Medina's cellars.

 
Accordingly he worked with greater enthusiasm and energy than ever, with the result that the following year's shipment was 62 butts, and by 1839 a total of 819 butts had been exported,
    The business had outgrown the tiny bodega in which it had been founded, and Gonzalez was looking for larger and more convenient premises to house his increasing stocks.
    Attached to the Collegiate Church was a small vineyard belonging to the keeper of a little cemetery which it adjoined. Beyond this (rather unfruitful) vineyard stretched a tract of rough, open country, many acres in extent. Mr. Gonzalez saw in this piece of ground an admirable place for his new bodegas, for, later on, if things went well, it could be extended almost indefinitely on land which would not be very costly.
    Accordingly the little vineyard was bought and the new building was erected It was called "La Sacristia," and still forms part of that vast cathedral of wine which is the present-day establishment of Gonzalez, Byass & Co. In most bodegas the place where the finest and rarest wines are kept is called " The Sacristy," but in this case the name was doubly appropriate.
    In the previous year (1838) Mr. Gonzalez had taken on a partner, and the firm was now styled M. M. Gonzalez & Co. The partner was Señor Aguera, a fairly wealthy man, who saw in the shipping of Sherry Wine a good investment for some of his surplus capital.
    The business of M. M. Gonzalez & Co. now began to deal with other aspects of the wine of Jerez than the mere shipping of it. Mr. Gonzalez' early efforts had necessarily to be confined to selecting good wines from the stocks of local vintners and shipping them with his name as a guarantee of their quality.
    Sherry is a wine which takes from seven up to almost any number of years to mature, and it is obvious that in these days M. M. Gonzalez & Co. were "shippers" in the strict sense of the word-and nothing else. Nowadays the expression "shippers " is used to denote firms which cultivate their own vineyards and carry out every other process in connection with the production of the matured wine. This is the position in which the present-day firm find themselves as "Sherry Shippers."
    But Mr. Gonzalez was anxious to become something more than a mere wine broker, and with Sr. Aguera's financial assistance as partner, and with the opportunities for storing quantities of wines in the larger new bodega, he began to build up those "soleras" which are the very life-blood of all Sherry-producing houses.
    A solera consists of a "scale" of butts, each containing wine of the same type in varying stages of maturity. It is by a subtle and complicated process of blending these "scales" that Sherry is eventually made ready for consumption.

These cherry-wood sherry casks are 300 years old.

    Many of the soleras which were established by Mr. Gonzalez in the first few years of his working life in Jerez are still in use at the present day. By skilful refreshment with new wines from time to time, as occasion required, they have known continuous life for nearly a hundred years. That is what is meant by Sherry being "born" so many years ago. As an example we may take one of the finest types of Oloroso wine which is called "Solera 1847." This means, not that the wine is of the 1847 vintage, but that the solera from which it has been "bred" was begun in the year 1847.
    This marvellous solera system may be likened to a fire lighted, say, a hundred years ago. It has been replenished at regular periods with fresh fuel, but it still remains the same fire.
    There are, in fact, soleras in the Gonzalez, Byass bodegas at the present time which can trace their pedigree back 250 years, but, of course, these were founded with wines which were already of very great age when the soleras were set up.
    Mr. M. M. Gonzalez realised very early in the day that the principal duty of a wine producer-and especially of a Sherry producer-is to provide soleras and stocks of wine for the future. Sherry, being always a blended wine, depends (whatever its particular type) upon a certain amount of old wine being included in the blend in order to give it the unmistakable characteristics of maturity and quality which are the hall-marks of all first-quality Sherries.
    All great enterprises have the very proper right to be proud of their founders-be they commercial firms, charitable organisations, or public schools. But the memory of their achievements grows dim after a number of years have passed, and in most cases the modern institution has changed to such an extent that its founder would never recognise in it his original handiwork.
    The Firm are not only proud of their Founder from a sentimental point of view, but they have also very real and practical reasons for remembering his foresight in providing for the future in the way that has just been referred to. The ancient soleras, we repeat, are the absolute life-blood of a Sherry- producing firm, and it is that very same stream started by Mr. M. M. Gonzalez which flows through the veins of the present enlarged and elaborated solera system, imparting to all wines shipped under the mark of "G. & B." that noble breeding which they would not-and could not-otherwise possess.
    We live in an age of anniversaries and centenaries, many of which may seem rather devoid of interest to the average person, but Gonzalez, Byass & Co. Ltd, are not celebrating for the mere sake of celebration, but because they have every reason to be thankful to their Founder, whose influence is still just as marked in the wines shipped by their house as if he were actually alive and still directing personally the welfare of the firm.

 

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