VARIOUS NATIONAL SOCIETIES. 131 



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lieves that grape growing will coutinue to extend in California, and that it will 

 he profitable at one cent per pound for the grapes, or twenty dollars a ton ; 

 which, with a yield of five tons per acre, will give gross receipts of $100 per 

 acre. He says grapes can be cultivated at $20 per acre. 



When gold was discovered in California, no one thought that, in a region so 

 free from rain in summer, grapes would ever add more to its glory than did the 

 glittering gold. The Jesuit Fathers tried to raise one variety ; now 400 

 varieties are grown, and the products amount to hundreds of thousands of tons 

 yearly. Irrigation has worked wonders. France, Germany, Spain and Italy 

 have furnished the vines, and with the vines came trained laborers, and last, 

 but not least, comes the patient Chinese laborer, who has helped the "Melican 

 man " more than he has been given credit for. 



Secretary Eagan said the grape crop had been so abundant this year that 

 perhaps the members were so tired of them as not to care to discuss them. In 

 his State (Indiana) grapes had been sold at retail for two cents per pound. 

 President Earle remarked that grapes were profitably grown in California for 

 one cent a pound. 



Mr. Charles A. Green, of New York, thought the paper solved the problem 

 of how California grape growers can compete with eastern growers. It was by 

 employing cheap Chinese labor and against this even high freights could not 

 protect eastern growers. 



Mr. F. C. Miller, of Ohio, said that he was of the opinion that the Worden, 

 a seedling of the Concord, was much superior to that old tavorite. He had 

 fruited the Worden for the first time, this year, and was much pleased with 

 results. He asked if it is true that Wordens did not hold well to the stems. 



Mr. Cushman said, so far as taste goes, he preferred the Worden, but he 

 had heard that, when well ripened, it drops from the vine quite badly. 



Mr. T. S. Hubbard, of New York, had been traveling for some weeks among 

 eastern vineyards, and his examinations had been very favorable to the Worden. 

 All the reports he had received had been to the effect that Worden holds to its 

 stem. He had visited Mr. Worden's vineyard in Oswego, N. Y., and had seen 

 the original vine that Mr. Worden said had yielded 11<> pounds of grapes dur- 

 ing each of the past three years. The crops of Worden this year were the 

 finest he had seen, and there was no rot. The Concord was not as productive 

 as last year, but Deleware and other varieties are doing well. The Worden, he 

 said, is a larger, handsomer and more attractive berry than Concord, and 

 ripens from a week to ten days earlier. 



Mr. E. T. Hollister, Missouri, said that grapes had rotted badly this year in 

 his State, and thus were a short crop. He thought growers were in too great 

 a hurry to get their grapes into market. They picked them too green; 

 started in with the Ives or sour Hartford and, when really good grapes were 

 brought forward, they came upon a broken-down market. He wished the 

 Ives and Hartford were thrown out entirely. Mr. Green said that would 

 not remedy the difficulty, as growers would then ship green Concords. 



Mr. F. C. Miller, Ohio, mentioned that his grapes rotted so badly one 

 season, that he used copperas (sulphate of iron) as a disinfectant, fearing 

 that the odor was unhealthful. This was in July. To his suprise, it 

 checked the rot. He had used it since successfully to prevent rot. He ap- 

 plied it dry, simply strewing it broadcast among and upon the vines, putting 



