1394 G. PATANE 



ures in the culture of the American vines were of frequent occurrence ; 

 either the vine chosen as stock (graft-bearer) was not adapted to the na- 

 ture of the soil, or the grafting rarely took successfully, or else the vine 

 showed but little affinity for the native plants chosen as scions. This 

 explains the fact that certain vines, such as York Madeira, which gave 

 rise to much enthusiasm at first, disappeared rapidly from the reconsti- 

 tuted vineyards ; that others, such as Clinton and Jacquez, commended as 

 direct bearers of good grapes, have suffered the same fate or have remained 

 only in Umited areas, and finally that certain excellent vines, such as 

 Riparia, which is cultivated in all districts, do not always .give the results 

 expected from them. 



Failures of this kind, however, have been experienced in other coun- 

 tries ravaged by the pest of phylloxera ; in France, for example, where 

 in the early years of reconstruction the vines Taylor, Concord, Clinton, 

 York Madeira, Jacquez, etc. were widely planted, though but few examples 

 of these vines are found there toda3^ 



France, which had preceded Italy in the work of reconstitution, had 

 in the meantime selected certain American vines and had produced some 

 new hybrids which, tested in the vine-growing regions, had given good 

 results. The Italian vine-growers, discouraged by their failures with plants 

 grown from seed, had recourse to the vines produced in France, and 

 began to import them. These vines were derived partly from the selection 

 of pure species (Riparia Gloire and Grand glabre-Rupestris Martin, Ganzin, 

 and. MetaUque-Berlandieri Resseguier Nos. i & 2) and partly from hybrids. 

 The latter group had been obtained by crossing American vines partly 

 among themselves (Riparia X Rupestris Couderc 3306 and 3309 etc.) and 

 partly with French vines (Aramon x Rupestris Ganzin No. i — Mour- 

 vedre X Rupestris 1202 — Chasselas X Berlandieri 41 B., etc.). 



In addition to these plants destined to serve as stocks, the French 

 vine-growers endeavoured to obtain hybrids which would act as direct- 

 bearers, and many of such hybrids obtained by Conderc, Seibel, Castel, 

 etc., were introduced into Italy. These plants, however, did not generally 

 give the results which were expected from them, and were not widely 

 cultivated. 



The Italian IVIinistry of Agriculture greatly encouraged the distribu- 

 tion of the French stocks, but the work of selection and hybridisation was 

 regarded as superfluous and its cessation was ordered in the institutions 

 under government control. Reconstitution by means of French stocks 

 alone was encouraged ; these were distributed everywhere but were not 

 always chosen with sufficient care. As a result the excellent work of 

 Grimaldi, Ruggeri, Pauesen, Longo and others who believed in recon- 

 stitution with American-ItaHan plants was neglected and sometimes 

 interrupted. 



In practice this new departure in the work of reconstitution did not 

 always give the results which were expected, and numerous and serious 

 failures occurred especially in districts with a dry chmate, so different 

 from those in which the new vines had. been developed and selected. These 



