76 Journal of Agriculture. [lo Feb., 1909. 



town on the coast some 50 miles north of Valencia— another instance of 

 Spanish viticuUural specialization. Here the vine zone is narrow, for the 

 rocky hills are close to the shore. The soil is a rather special one, a 

 light reddish soil resting on a stiff clay at a depth of a few inches. In 

 such a soil, and in such a dry situation, the grapes though rot large have 

 a thick golden skin and excellent fla\-our. They are able to stand packing 

 far better than is usual with Muscats, for the Moscatel grown here is none 

 other than the Muscat of Denia which appears to be identical with the one 

 we grow here under the name of Gordo Blanco. 



The fruit is gathered between the 2olh of July and the middle of 

 September. Large quantities are sent to Pans in baskets. It would 

 appear that there is a future for the shipment of some of our Gordos in 

 the fresh state. For such a destination they would no doubt require to 

 be specially grown — planted in dry situations and not irrigated too short 

 a time before maturity. Without going into the question of the possi- 

 bility of landing properly grown Gordos in Europe, there should "be a 

 large demand for this class of fruit in India, China and Japan, as well 

 as in New Zealand. 



M. Poirier has an article on the Benicasim grape trade in La Revue 

 de Viticulture of 26th November last. He describes how water is stored 

 for the use of the vine by the opening of trenches to be filled with vine 

 prunings and also manure, rubbish, &c. — a practice I observed in different 

 parts of Europe. 



THE FRUIT CASES ACT IDOO. 



/. G. Turner, Senior Inspector, Fruit Exports and Imports. 



This Act, although it has been over two years in operation, is only 

 now being put to a thorough test. In some respects it has been copied 

 from the Tasmanian Act, but it differs from that Act chiefly in the fact 

 that the local measure provides for the marking of the cases with the 

 maker's name, address and guarantee. It is around this particular sec- 

 tion of the Act that, at the present time, so much controversy is raging. 

 A large number of persons have been ref)orted to the Department for 

 exposing for sale fruit in cases which, although of the standard size, 

 were not marked with the maker's name, address and guarantee. Some 

 of these offenders have already been prosecuted and fined and it is ex- 

 pected that others will be shortly dealt with similarly. 



The committee (representing the fruit-growers, retailers, patent case- 

 makers, &c.) which was responsible for the recommendations made to the 

 Minister concerning this measure, foresaw that unless sections were intro- 

 duced into the Act making it compulsory that the maker's name, address 

 and guarantee be stamped on every case, there would be little use in 

 expecting uniformity of size. The official view coincides with this. It 

 is obvious that if no visible and easily-understood standard of measure- 

 ment be «;hown on every case, buyers and sellers will conduct all their 

 business bv guess-w^ork, rather than by foot-rule measurement, and the 

 result will be that things will soon drift into the old haphazard method 

 of former days. 



Concerning certain sections of the Act, a period of two years was 

 allowed so as to enable dealers and others co dispose of irregular-sized 

 cases. During that period such cases could be freely exchanged pro- 

 vided that the weight of the contents had been marked on the outside. 

 Upon expiry of the time of grace (28th December, 1908) no cases, other 



