The Grape. 1 1 3 



curious that the vine is not more used as a purely decora- 

 tive plant. Poor as the fruit may be, compared with that 

 of the hothouse, how beautiful the spectacle, common in 

 the southern counties, occasional in the north, of the vine 

 covering the cottage-front. Remembering what the vine 

 stands for, metaphorically, in Scripture, one of the good 

 signs of the growth in our country of pure taste in matters 

 of church-ornament, which, when dealt with lovingly, as 

 by the Plantagenet architects, is shown outside as well as 

 inside, will be planting a vine beside the porch, and 

 training it so as to form an archway to the House of 

 God. 



Any attempt to trace the history of the original diffu- 

 sion of the vine must needs be hopeless. Nothing, 

 probably, will ever be ascertained of earlier date than the 

 time of Julius Caesar, who, after his subjugation of ancient 

 Gaul, B.C. 55, took possession of the Valley of the Rhine, 

 and soon introduced many kinds of fruit from Italy. 

 From Ausonius we learn that the banks of the Moselle 

 possessed this plant by the middle of the fourth century, 

 at which period, also, grapes were grown in the neigh- 

 bourhood of primitive Paris, but it was not for quite a 

 couple of centuries afterwards that the cultivation became 

 general either in Germany or France. Charlemagne, that 

 admirable patron of the useful arts, horticulture in parti- 

 cular, gave grape-growing his warmest encouragement. 

 The introduction into England took place under the later 

 Roman governors. Vineyards would seem to have been 

 first planted in our island about A.D. 280. They are 

 Q 



