GRAPE. 5 



but its culture is now confined to the garden as a dessert 

 fruit ; and they have in that country not only the best varie- 

 ties, but they grow the fruit to a larger size, and of a higher 

 flavour, than is done any where else in the world ; this is 

 owing to the perfection of their artificial climates, and the 

 great attention paid to soil and subsoil, and other points of 

 culture. The fruit is produced in some vineries during every 

 month in the year ; and in the London markets (generally) 

 it is to be had in the highest degree of perfection from March 

 to January. 



The vine will thrive in any soil that has a dry bottom ; 

 and in such as are rich and deep it will grow luxuriantly, 

 and produce abundance of large fruit; in shallow, dry, 

 chalky, or gravelly soils, it will produce less fruit, but of 

 better flavour. Speechly recommends dung reduced to a 

 black mould, the dust and dirt of roads, the offal of animals, 

 or butchers' manure, horn shavings, old rags, shavings of 

 leather, bone dust, dung of deer and sheep, human excre- 

 ment when duly meliorated by time, a winter's frost, and 

 repeatedly turning over. Abercrombie says that dung out 

 of a cow-house, perfectly rotted, is a fine manure for the 

 vine ; he recommends drainings from dunghills to be used 

 over the ground once in ten or fourteen days from the time 

 the buds rise, till the fruit is set, and that fresh horse dung 

 be spread over the ground in autumn as a manure, and also 

 to protect the roots from the inclemency of the weather ; 

 some, however, disapprove of manuring high, as being cal- 

 culated to produce wood rather than fruit* 



The general mode of propagating the vine is by cuttings, 

 either a foot or more long, with a portion of two year old 



* It has been proved by repeated experiments that the best manure for 

 vines, is the branches pruned from the vines themselves, cut into small 

 pieces and mixed with the soil by means of a garden hoe. Dr. Liebig, in 

 his 'Organic Chemistry,' mentions several instances of vines being kept in 

 a thriving condition for from ten to thirty years by the trimmings of vines 

 alone. The discovery was made by poor peasants, who could not afford 

 to buy the ordinary kinds of manure. 



