Volume 72: Macarthur family correspondence relating to wine, 1846-1900: No. 280

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[Page 280]

that the retailing of native-produced wines is at present a monopoly in the hands of the Licensed Victuallers, which considering that the consumption of Colonial wines might (as it not improbably would) tend to diminish the sale of more intoxicating and (to them) more profitable articles have hitherto naturally enough, not shewn much inclination to promote a taste for the home made beverage.
Possibly objection might be taken to the expression I have used of the "absurd restrictions on the free sale and general consumption of Australian Wines" but when it is considered that in no other country in the world is a similar native grown product subject to such trammels and obstacles as wine is in New South Wales I think it will be admitted that such an epithet as "absurd and preposterous", when applied to these uncalled for and unwise restrictions, is neither exaggerated nor inapplicable

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