After performing the round of the celliers we descend into the _caves_, a complete labyrinth of gloomy underground corridors excavated in the bed of chalk which underlies the city, and roofed and walled with solid masonry, more or less blackened by age. In one of these cellars we catch sight of rows of workpeople engaged in the operation of dosing, corking, securing, and shaking the bottles of wine which have just left the hands of the _dégorgeur_ by the dim light of half-a-dozen tallow-candles. The latest invention for liqueuring the wine is being employed. Formerly, to prevent the carbonic acid gas escaping from the bottles while the process of liqueuring was going on, it was necessary to press a gutta-percha ball connected with the machine, in order to force the escaping gas back. The new machine, however, renders this unnecessary, the gas, by its own power and composition, forcing itself back into the wine.
In the adjoining cellar of St. Charles are stacks of bottles awaiting the manipulation of the _dégorgeur_; while in that of St. Ferdinand men are engaged in examining other bottles before lighted candles, to make certain that the sediment is thoroughly dislodged, and the wine perfectly clear before the disgorgement is effected. Here, too, the corking, wiring, and stringing of the newly-disgorged wine are going on. Another flight of steps leads to the second tier of cellars, where the moisture trickles down the dank dingy walls, and save the dim light thrown out by the candles we carried, and by some other far-off flickering taper, stuck in a cleft stick, to direct the workmen, who with dexterous turns of their wrists, give a twist to the bottles, all is darkness. On every side bottles are reposing in various attitudes, the majority in huge square piles on their sides, others in racks slightly tilted; others, again, almost standing on their heads, while some, which through overinflation have come to grief, litter the floor and crunch beneath our feet. Tablets are hung against each stack of wine indicating its age, and from time to time a bottle is held up before the light to show us how the sediment commences to form, or to explain how it eventually works its way down the neck of the bottle, and finally settles on the cork. Suddenly we are startled by a loud report, resembling a pistol-shot, which reverberates through the vaulted chamber, as a bottle close at hand explodes, dashing out its heavy bottom as neatly as though it had been cut by a diamond, and dislocating the necks and pounding-in the sides of its immediate neighbours. The wine trickles down, and eventually finds its way along the sloping sides of the slippery floor to the narrow gutter in the centre.