Address bv Dr. Hahn. 47 



1 cannot leave this suljject without once more drawing \our 

 attention to the use and application of scientific investigations to 

 practical purposes. I have already mentioned that forest trees take 

 off a given area more lime than potatoes. Since the time of Liebig it 

 has been known that of all our fruit trees the apple tree requires the 

 largest amount of lime, and thrives best on calcareous soil. Who 

 is not reminded of this fact when he sees the poor apple trees full 

 of insects and fungi, grown on the soils poor in lime, and compares 

 these with the healthy, large, well-developed apple trees grown in 

 Worcester, Robertson, Montagu, and Ladysmith, \vhere the soils 

 of the orchards contain a fair amount of lime. 



It is regrettable that there is also in arboriculture such an utter 

 disregard of scientific principles. " Everything has to be practical ; 

 evervthing has to be based on practice." A continuous repetition 

 of this routine is merely an excuse for the ignorance of scientific 

 principles. But I think it is the most " impractical ' procedure to 

 disregard certain facts which are results of scientific investigations. 

 To follow practice alone is as unreasonable as to work on theory 

 only. No branch of human occupation has for its progress been more 

 dependent upon a combination of theory and practice than agricul- 

 ture in the widest sense of the word, including also fruit-culture, 

 arboriculture and viticulture. The high development which the 

 several branches of agriculture and agricultural industries have 

 attained in Europe and America is in the first place due to a proper 

 and systematic application of the results of scientific, more particu- 

 larly chemical, investigation and research. This is the only road 

 which leads to progress and success, and we in South Africa have to 

 follow in order to emerge out of the present unsatisfactorv amateur 

 stage, and to become true and real progressives. 



A most important branch of Agriculture in the Cape Colony is 

 Viticulture. The \vork of the wine-farmer is partly of a purely agri- 

 cultural nature, namely, the work in the vineyard, and partly of an 

 industrial or technical nature, namely, the making of the wine and 

 the distilling of brandy. It is well known that the Colonial wine- 

 farmers take a keen interest in the work in the vinevard. and have 

 shown in this part of their work an unusual aptitude, which mani- 

 fested itself during the last ten years in the reconstruction of the 

 vineyards destroyed by Phylloxera, by planting grafted American 

 stocks. I have seen reconstructed vineyards in some parts of the 

 ■Colony which could not be surpassed in any \\ine-i)roducing country 

 in the world. The cellar-work throughout the wine districts is, how- 

 ever, not in a satisfactory state. In explanation of this it has been 

 said that it is only natural that a man who is accustomed to open 

 air work does not feel inclined to do work in close, confined cellars, 

 and that for this reason the cellar-work is not attended to as it should 

 be. I am not satisfied with this explanation at all. Wine-making 

 is by no means a simple operation, which may be done in a haphazard 

 way. In order to produce a sound wine, w'hich need not be Pasteur- 

 ized, or fortified, or doctored in some way, it is indispensable 

 to pay close attention to the principles of Chemistry. Even' wine- 



