In the village church of Hautvillers, last week, French peasants knelt devoutly. In their thoughts and prayers was the name of a man dead these 200 years and more. They paid tribute to the Benedictine monk Dom Pérignon.
What had Dom Pérignon done, visitors wondered, to deserve such gratitude? Villagers explained. Dom Pérignon had been the abbey's cellar keeper. It was he who discovered that bottles could be stoppered with cork. And, far more important, he had invented the bubbling wine known as champagne. For a long time, of course, people thought he had been helped by the Evil One. But every...
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