HYBRIDIZING. 129 



tion where it shall be equal to the foreign grape in its qualities, 

 and adapted to our climate in its conditions of vigor and 

 hardihood. 



In passing, let me bear testimony to the work of those 

 eminent men who in this ancient town have done so much for 

 horticulture. To the elder Manning, who introduced the pear 

 at great expense, and with a European correspondence some- 

 times almost diplomatic ; who, in advance of others, brought to 

 this country those choice specimens of the pear which have since 

 been disseminated, and for which his modesty prevented him 

 from receiving the credit. To your Mr. Rogers, the grape- 

 grower, and Mr. Allen, two gentlemen who, I believe, are the 

 only men in this country who have had absolute success in 

 hybridizing or cross-breeding the foreign grape upon our native 

 stock. Your Mr. Rogers, in particular, has done a great work. 

 I am delighted to find that a gentleman of his skill and persis- 

 tency has taken that method of reproduction, because, having 

 taken another mode myself, we shall be likely, by one mode or 

 the other, to secure the result we aim at. Hybridizing with the 

 tender foreign parent is attended, I suspect, with this danger — 

 of making the plants more tender, and affecting our native 

 stock too much for our climate ; but possibly, very possibly, Mr. 

 Rogers may succeed in getting a hybrid which will be quite 

 hardy, and the quality of which shall be so good as to suit the 

 most fastidious. I know that by my method of reproduction 

 we must wait a long time for the choicest grape ; but I believe 

 that by my method I may ultimately achieve success, and I 

 think myself it is the surest method — slow but sure. The wild 

 grape, in the second generation, gave me the Concord ; the 

 grandchildren of the Concord have given me, this year, grapes 

 of so much better quali y than any before raised, that I regard 

 the problem as settled, that we shall have grapes as good as we 

 desire, that shall be perfectly hardy in open-air culture. 



Now, having this primary fact of vigor and hardihood in the 

 grape you are going to plant, all the conditions of culture in 

 the vineyard must be present or you will not have success. You 

 want a suitable soil, you want a proper aspect, you want to pre- 

 pare that soil properly, to plant and train the crop within certain 

 reasonable and proper conditions, or even then you will not have 

 success. There is such a thing as a little wise neglect in grape- 



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