STATE AGEICULTURAL SOCIETY. 135 



agriculture, can only take place in a liiglily cultivated state of 

 agricultural science. It was needful for the world, in the infancy 

 of society, that the great staples of human food should be culti- 

 vated in the simplest manner. Society then must have well nigh 

 perished had human food depended on the application of special 

 manures. The cultivation of the grape has long been, in orien- 

 tal climeS; a large contribution to human food. Such culture, 

 we must believe, was early practiced without the aid of specific 

 manures. We may now, amid our scientific and practical 

 advancement, discover the value of manures where eo applied, espe- 

 cially in incongenial climes and in the culture of deteriorated varie- 

 ties, whether of grapes or of other plants. But from the beginning I 

 think it could not have been so. Nor will it be said that all 

 oriental grape culture was in highly appropriate soils, such as the 

 volcanic regions are admitted to present. All oriental grape cul- 

 ture was not, and is not, in volcanic regions. 



b. Soil mechanically considered. — Experience seems to suggest 

 that the grape needs a soil dry and loose, a heavy clay soil pro- 

 ducing a gross and unhealthy growth. That necessity, however, 

 is probably confined to the immediate central position of the 

 grape root, since the analogy of the most healthful native grapes, 

 in natural positions where water is within the distant reach of 

 their roots, seem.s to indicate that such remote presence of water 

 is not prejudicial to their health. Here however, as in the con- 

 templation of the chemical character of the soil, it should not be 

 forgotten ftiat, in years of prevalent grape disease, such disease 

 pays little regard to the mechanical constitution of the soil. We 

 are led then, as before, to look for the causes of grape disease in 

 some other connection. To all this it may be replied, that the 

 Spitzenburgh apple, which is so delicious when produced in its 

 native valley, fails entirely to produce fine fruit in the neighbor- 

 hood of Boston; that the Virgalieu pear has long been declining 

 i)n all the Atlantic sea-board; and that the Port grape produces 

 Port wine only in the neighborhood of Oporto. In these particu- 

 lar cases of failure, and others like them, we may safely atlmit 

 that the cause may exist partly in the soil and not exclusively in 

 the climate. It should not be forgotten here, however, that the 

 failure in these cases is both permanent and apparently irreme- 

 diable, while the ordinary disease of the grape seems marked more 



