144 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



night-soil, with bone flour and live wood ashes and a little plaster 

 of Paris. Put the seeds in a row an inch deep, and cover the 

 row with a board, that the seeds may not be disturbed during 

 the winter. If there are cut-worms or wire-worms, or insects 

 likely to disturb the young seedlings when they start, you will 

 find that they will come to the under surface of the. board for 

 the sake of warmth, and they are easily destroyed there. When 

 the vines grow it will be necessary to shade them until they have 

 got the third leaf; after that they will endure the severest sun- 

 shine without harm ; and unless the season be very dry indeed, 

 they will not require water. They will grow with more or less 

 vigor, some more vigorously than others ; but out of these 

 seedlings you would be likely to get some absolute improve- 

 ments. While they arc growing in the bed some will exhibit 

 more vigor than others, and those are usually, though not 

 always, the vines which return to the original coarse type, and 

 to the vigor incident to the original vine, and also to its coarse 

 habits. The improvements will usually be found in those which 

 grow with a little less vigor. I do not move them at the end of 

 the first year, because I find by experience that some of the 

 seeds do not grow the first year, but do the second. In the 

 second year a new crop of seedlings will come up in these same 

 rows ; and in my experience those seeds which are two years in 

 coming up give the best results. Out of them you get your 

 successes more than out of the others. I have had rampant 

 growers, which I planted out by themselves, supposing they gave 

 some improvements on the old vine ; and out of one-eighth of 

 an acre of such seedlings I had five very choice vines, with all 

 the vigor of the original vine, and improvements decidedly 

 worth saving. All the remainder proved either barren or worth- 

 less. These seedlings can be planted in rows, not more than 

 two feet apart, and the rows six feet apart, and can be easily 

 looked after from year to year. They are not a great deal of 

 trouble ; they grow while you sleep ; and the fifth or sixth year 

 they will bear ; out of an eighth of an acre you would almost 

 certainly have improvements — perhaps great prizes. The man 

 who can get a grape of a quality equal to or better than the 

 Isabella, which will ripen in August, and lie perfectly hardy and 

 prolific, has achieved a fortune of at least five thousand dollars 



