The number of kinds of wine used at dinner varies with the taste of the host or hostess. When a great dis-play is desired, as many as twelve varieties are served, but for ordinary dinners four is generally the limit. Indeed, many dinners are now given at which wine is omitted altogether, and at simple dinners there is often but one wine, which is a choice claret or champagne. When three wines are to be served, they usually consist of a fine sherry with the soup, claret with the course after the fish, and champagne with the roast. If champagne alone is selected, it should be served just after the fish. The following may serve as a

Wine Menu

With Raw Oysters White Wine (Sauterne, Rhine, etc). "Fish Sherry or Madeira.

"Meat, Champagne.

"Game, Claret.

" Dessert, Sherry, Port or Burgundy.

Regarding the temperature at which wines should be served: sherry should be thoroughly chilled; Madeira neither warm nor cold, but about the temperature of the room ; claret the same as Madeira, and never with ice ; and champagne can scarcely be served too cold.

With Raw Oysters " Soup, " Fish, " Meat, " Game, " Dessert,

White Wine (Sauterne, Rhine, etc).

Sherry or Madeira.

Champagne.

Claret.

Sherry, Port or Burgundy.

Regarding the temperature at which wines should be served: sherry should be thoroughly chilled; Madeira neither warm nor cold, but about the temperature of the room ; claret the same as Madeira, and never with ice ; and champagne can scarcely be served too cold.

Wine should be unpacked as soon as possible after delivery, and the bottles laid upon their sides in some place in which the changes of temperature will not be felt. Red wines, especially clarets, should be kept dry and warm, as they are injured more by cold than by heat. They are, therefore, better stored elsewhere than in the cellar. Champagne and Rhine wines withstand cold better than heat, the latter often causing fermentation. Sherry, Maderia and all spirits should be kept warm.