From the French. The Wine of Jurançon

By Charles Coran

LITTLE sweet wine of Jurançon,

You are dear to my memory still!

With mine host and his merry song,

Under the rose-tree I drank my fill.

Twenty years after, passing that way,

Under the trellis I found again

Mine host, still sitting there au frais,

And singing still the same refrain.

The Jurançon, so fresh and bold,

Treats me as one it used to know;

Souvenirs of the days of old

Already from the bottle flow.

With glass in hand our glances met;

We pledge, we drink. How sour it is!

Never Argenteuil piquette

Was to my palate sour as this!

And yet the vintage was good, in sooth;

The self-same juice, the self-same cask!

It was you, O gayety of my youth,

That failed in the autumnal flask!