It pained the young American to find that the royal visitor was no connoisseur, gulping his wine instead of sipping and lingering over it.

But there is haste to express intense admiration.

"His habit of walking two hours under the trees of the Allee Lichtenthal was also mine, and it was with pleasure I bowed most respectfully to him day by day." The final touch to the McAllister education came at Pau, where he passed the following winter, and the winter after.

He ran down to Bordeaux, made friends with all the wine fraternity there, tasted and criticized, wormed himself into the good graces of the owners of the enormous Bordeaux caves, and learned there for the first time what claret was.

"There I learned how to give dinners; to esteem and value the Coq de Bruyere of the Pyrenees, and the Pic de Mars." Thus equipped for the serious business of life as he conceived it, he returned home.