tl6 OS EARLT RIPENING OF GRAPES. 



the«e coming so forward on the forehead as scarcely to leave 

 any space between, will be found essential characters of 

 distinction. 



I have not been able to discover the hybernaculum of 

 this species, but it is reasonable to believe its torpid state 

 is passed in similar situations to those in which all but the 

 V. ferrum-equinum and v. minutus retire during the colder 

 mouths; none of which appear to be subterraneous. 



VIII. 



An Account of the Method of hastening the Maturation of 

 Grapes. By John V¥illiams Esq., im a Letter to the 

 Right JJon. Sir Joseph Banks, Bart. K. B. P. R. S. #c* 



SIR, 



Grapes do not JlT is a fact well known to gardeners, that vines, when ex- 

 welP'* "Tf n posed in this climate to the open air, although trained to 

 climate. walls with southern aspects, and having every advantage 



of judicious culture, yet in the ordinary course of our sea- 

 sons ripen their fruit with difficulty. This remark, however, 

 though true in general, admits of some exceptions, for I have 

 occasionally seen trees of the common white muscadine, and 

 black duster grapes, that have matured their fruit very well, 

 and earlier by a fortnight or three weeks, than others of the 

 same kinds, and apparently possessing similar advantages 

 of soil and aspect. 

 Karliest on old The vines that ripened the fruit thus early, I have gene* 

 trees with long ra |]y remarked, were oM trees having trunks eight Or ten 

 feet high, before their bearing branches commenced. It 

 occurred to me, that this disposition to ripen early might 

 be occasioned by the dryness and rigidity of the vessels of 

 from the circu- the old trunk obstructing the circulation of that portion of 



obstructed^ ** ie 8a ;P» wn ' cu ' s supposed to descend from the leaf. And 



to prove whether or not my conjectures were correct, I made 



Incisions incisions through the bark on the trunks of several vines 



through the^ g row i n g m in y garden, removing a circle of bark from 



the alburnum* 



naked, * Horticultural Sociefjr, vol. I, p. 107. 



each 



