CELLARS SOLD UP

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 30 April 1942, Page 6

CELLARS SOLD UP

WINES FETCH BIG PRICES Some very fine private cellars are being sold. probably as a result of heavy taxation and living costs, writes a correspondent from London to the Melbourne "Age.” Two bottles of benedictine brought LG each, and this is believed to be a record. A bottle of liqueur brought £5 10s, and at another sa.e chartreuse fetched £5 a bottle. This sale was an interesting one. Mr J. Christie, a wealthy music lover, living at Glyndebourne, in Sussex, there initiated and carried on the music festival which has done much for English musical life There he accumulated a splendid cellar of wines to accompany the perfect music of his opera house on the Downs, near Lewes In an hour and a quarter it was all dispersed under the auctioneer's hammer in the City of London, and some remarkable prices were secured. Twenty-two large bottles of yellow chartreuse brought .115 13s 4d a bottle, and other wines brought heavy prices, so that, at an estimate, more than £17,000 was realised by the sale. Mr Christie said that the disposal of the wine cellar did not mean that he would not reopen Glyndebourne after the war. "I feel,” he said, "that alter the war the patrons of the festival will prefer to see, say iced lager on the tab es round them rather than the expensive wines which they used to be able to afford." The high prices are. of course, being secured by reason of the marked shortage in the big hotels and restaurants. There are still people J who seem to be able and willing tp pay