304 Notes and Gleanings. 



Grape Culture in Canada. — Few people are aware of the extent to 

 which this new branch of agricultural industry is now being carried in Canada. 

 The wonderful success of the vine on Kelly's Island, and other islands on Lake 

 Erie, has set thousands of farmers on the shores of that lake, on both the Cana- 

 dian and American sides, to the cultivation of the vine, and the consequences 

 cannot but be beneficial. All round the shores of Essex and Kent farmers are 

 waking up, and cultivating the vine largely. In the township of Gosfield alone, 

 a few neighbors met, a short time since, and clubbed together to give such an 

 order for vines as would, from its extent, reduce 'the cost to the lowest wholesale 

 rate. The consequence was a subscription of eight hundred dollars, which 

 accompanied the order to one of our leading nurserymen for vines alone. Thus 

 between five and six thousand vines were set out, in that immediate neighbor- 

 hood alone, in one season ; and as vines are the most easily propagated fruit 

 tree we have, by cuttings and layers, it may easily be supposed, that when once 

 a plantation is estabhshed, our thrifty farmers will become their own nursery- 

 men. Grapes, throughout the Niagara peninsula, are becoming as common as 

 apples ; and this may well be imagined, when one man this last season \v3Afojtr- 

 teen ions of grapes so injured by the frost, that he (not knowing that they were 

 really not injured for wine) sold them at two or three cents per pound, for the man- 

 ufacture of either wine or vinegar. Throughout the present vineyards of Kent 

 and Essex the Catawba comes to perfection, as do also most of the sorts grown 

 at and about Cincinnati, which was the cradle of vine culture in America. The 

 sweet kinds, such as the Delaware, and others of that class, yield good wine 

 without additional saccharine matter ; but to grapes more redundant in acid 

 large quantities of sugar are added, so as to give body and strength to the wine. 

 The demand for grapes in their natural state is now so great, however, and they 

 carry so well to market, that most of the crop is boxed up in small parcels fit for 

 the retail trade, and sent off to the nearest city markets. And this will con- 

 tinue until the quantity produced becomes so great as to flood the market ; the 

 chief part of the crop will then be made into wine, and other things which natu- 

 rally spring from that manufacture. Canada Farmer. 



Tannin for curing leather is a product of sumac, and nearly all of it used in 

 this country is imported from Sicily. But the sumac tree is a natural growth, 

 and in the mild climate of Virginia yields twenty per cent, more of the astrin- 

 gent principle than the imported article. The crude sumac in Virginia, manu- 

 factured this year, amounts to forty-one hundred tons, worth eighty-two thou- 

 sand dollars — a large product from an unorganized and shiftless industry, which 

 is of as little account as picking berries. 



The Pecan Trade is lively in Western Texas. The Victoria Advocate has 

 heard of one merchant paying out five thousand dollars in less than one week for 

 this spontaneous product of the forest. The average price paid is three dollars, 

 specie, per bushel. 



Peas in January. — A Watcrbury (Conn.) woman jiicked green peas from 

 her jrarden for her New Year's dinner. 



