Aug. S,190S.] Agricultural Gazelle of N.S.TF. 671 



t-.vo kinds of blood oranges, sweet but rough-skinned, and said to be imported 

 from Italy. The technical branches of the Department of Agriculture are 

 housed in a very fine set of modern buildings on the Buda side of the Danube, 

 and have fine grounds and experiment plots of ground round them. Here I 

 met all the experts, consisting of the Chief of the chemical branch, viticulture, 

 pathology, entomology, etc. Dr. Fablonowsky, the Assistant Director, is 

 also the Entomologist, and has a very fine collection of all kinds of injurious 

 insects and samples of the damage done by them exhibited in cases. The 

 phylloxera here, as everywhere else in Europe, has done an immense 

 amount (^f damage to the viticultural industry, and here in all clay or loamy 

 soil they are replanting with American stocks, or going into the light sandy 

 soil of the hills, where the phylloxera cannot exist. This has to a considerable 

 extent changed the nature of their vintage, and they pr-oduce a great deal of 

 light wine that is chiefiy sold in Germany and Northern Europe, but will 

 not sell in England. The Government have constructed some very extensive 

 wine cellars in the side of the mountain, outside Buda, down the river, 

 where they mature a large quantity of wine grown in their own vineyards of 

 2,500 acres. Here they also have a staff" and train ten young men a.s "cellar- 

 masters." I visited tliese cellars, and was shown all over the institution, 

 where they also hold auction sales of wine four times a yeai". 



I also had the opportunity of going down to Nyir Egyhaza, near Tokay, at 

 the invitation of Dr. Kallay, and on Easter Sunday visited some vineyards, 

 where I found the rows are planted so close together that everything has to 

 be done by hand once the vines are planted. Most of the small growers 

 here sell the grapes, or simply press the grapes and sell the must to tlie larger 

 growers who have wine cellars. All the soil here and round the hills of, 

 Tokay is a very fine sandy soil, and phylloxera proof, with few exceptions. 



On the 21st April, 1908, T left by the Orient Express at midnight for 

 Constantinople, on my road to Cyprus and Cairo, and reached there on the 

 morning of the 23rd. Soon after my arrival, found that I could not get a 

 steamer till the 30th, so called upon the British Consul, who very kindly 

 gave me letters to several people interested in agriculture. 



At the invitation of Dr. Thompson, a British merchant interested in wine 

 culture, and having large vineyards at Bolandjvk, about 12 miles out iii 

 Asiatic Turkey, I spent Sunday afternoon at his orchai-ds, and saw the 

 methods used also in some Turkish vineyards adjoining his. At one time 

 they made a large quantity of wine, but through the bad times that came to 

 the Armenians, the chief wine-drinkers in Turkey, they have given up 

 making wine, and sell the grapes for eating. 



All the orchards through Turkey have been more or less destroyed by the 

 phylloxera, which appeared about twenty-five years ago. Mr. Thompson's 

 vines, now twelve years old, are all grafted on American stocks, and are 

 some of the largest vines I have seen ; they are simply staked, and tied up at 

 the top. ]Most of the Turkish wine growers graft on a native grape that 

 grows wild in the country. 



