The Blood of the Grape: the Wine Trade Text Book - Andre Simon, 1920 here


Our needs are numerous and varied and the traders upon whom we depend for the satisfaction of our needs are many and different, but none among them should be made to realize more forcibly the true purpose of commerce than those who are responsible for the supply of our food and drink.

The supply of precious stones may fail for a time or their price may rise considerably without the moral and physical well-being of the race being seriously affected; but no sooner is there any falling off in the quantity or quality of our supplies of food and drink, or an appreciable increase in their cost, than the whole people suffer; their grievance is immediate and universal, the amount and quality of their work falls off, and the cost of everything goes up.

Our usefulness in life as well as our enjoyment of life depend largely upon our bodily and mental health, and our health depends largely upon what we eat and drink.

The trader who poisons his fellow men is a rogue if the greed of gain be his incentive ; he is only a fool but he is just as dangerous if he commits the same offence through sheer ignorance. There is more harm done in the 

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world by people who mean well but know no better than by those who do not mean well but know better.

First of all you must mean well; mean to be straight and to do the right thing, always mean to learn and to know. You must be honest at heart and willing of mind ; if you are not, I cannot hope to teach you anything but, if you are, I will do my best to make you: take a legitimate pride in your trade and an intelligent interest in the living blood of the grape.

No time given nor trouble taken by me shall I grudge, if only it may be my good fortune to teach you to value honest wine, to love it, and to make others appreciate its great charm and its greater worth.

Before telling you anything about what wine is, how it should be treated and whence it comes, I am anxious to impress upon you the fact that you belong to a branch of commerce than which there is none more honourable nor of greater antiquity, none possessing more possibilities for good and evil, none more responsible, none requiring greater knowledge and none more difficult to master.

In the United States, they killed off the native races with raw, poisonous rye spirit thanks to which fortunes were made and chapels built.  

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                      The Blood of the Grape - Guildhall Library, London - Andre Simon Collection ref - WTC 655