THE GRAPES OF NEW YORK. 43 



in 1802 but the Encyclopedia did not appear until 1804.' Embodied in the 

 article is an " interesting paper on the vines of the United States drawn up 

 by William Bartram at the request of the editor." Bartram's paper was 

 written in the spring of 1802. Mease's discussion of the vine merits 

 especial attention. While the best of Antill's and Legaux's observations are 

 made use of, yet much is added to them and the paper is far more reasonable 

 in every respect than those of either of the two previous Vv-riters, and is 

 wholly lacking in the ostentatious modesty and circumlocution of Antill 

 and the grandiloquence and self esteem of Legaux. It may justly be con- 

 sidered the first rational discussion of the culture of the grape in America. 

 Mease's paper deserves attention for another reason. It contains the 

 first public utterance condemning the culture of the Old World grape and 

 recommending the cultivation of native grapes. He says: "From the 

 experience, however, of the editor and his friends who have found much 

 difficulty in naturalizing foreign vines, he recommends the cultivation of 

 the native grapes of the United -States, particularly the Vitis sylvcstris, 

 [Vitis aestivalis] or small blue or bunch grape; Bland's, Tasker's or Alex- 

 ander's, and the bull-grape of Carolina and Georgia." It appears from 

 the whole discussion by Mease and Bartram in this treatise that the only 

 varieties of native grapes cultivated in 1804 were, Alexander's or Tasker's 

 grape, Bland's grape, the Bull grape- of Carolina and Georgia, and the 

 Raccoon grape. 



Two years later, 1806, S. W. Johnson^ and Bernard McMahon ■* pub- 

 had made arrangements for the publication of the first fascicle last year; but the very unfavourable 

 season, which had prevented the ripening of the species (Bland's Grape) I had resolved first to describe, 

 obliging me to defer the task until the present year, when I hope the weather will prove more favour- 

 able. Medical gentlemen, and others fond of natural history, and anxious to have the description of 

 American vines and their classification completed, will have it much in their power to assist my 

 undertaking. I have taken measures to have the Bull or Bullet grape of Carolina and Georgia sent 

 me ; but I shall nevertheless be much indebted for any specimens of the plant that may be transmitted," 



' The sime year, 1S04, Mease published Bartram's paper, with some omissions, in the Medical 

 Repository (Second Hexade, 1:19) under the heading, " Account of the Species, Hybrids, and other 

 Varieties of the Vine of Xorth-America. By Mr. William Bartram, of Pennsylvania." The same 

 paper was again published in 1830 in Prince's .4 Treatise on the Vine. pp. 216-220. 



- Bartram states that " bull " is an abbreviation of bullet; the grapes being so called because they 

 were of the size of a bullet. He held that the name ' taurina " applied to the species was not proper. 



^Johnson's Rural Economy: 155-197. New Brunswick, N. J., 1806. 



* McMahon's Gardening: 226-241. Philadelphia, Pa., 1806. 



