116 OPEN AIR GRAPE CULTURE. 



That grapes will not ripen well, and that vines will 

 not be healthy under a dense mass of matted foliage, 

 we freely admit. But this is not an evil to be reme 

 died by the knife. In this case, most emphatically, 

 prevention is better that cure. 



When we reflect that the amount of organizable 

 matter which can be furnished by any vine is limited, 

 and also that all rank and succulent growth is prejudi 

 cial to the production of fruit, we can readily appre 

 ciate the advantage of directing the sap to the pro 

 duction of fruit, rather than wood and leaves. But 

 we must also remember that every ounce of organiz 

 able matter which is embodied in leaves or stem, is 

 so much capital invested, and is no more to be thrown 

 away than the stock of the moneyed capitalist, which 

 only brings in two per cent., even though his neigh 

 bor, on a different investment, receives ten. 



The leaves are the laboratories in which the sap is 

 prepared for the nourishment, not only of the fruit, 

 but of the wood, and the more of them we have the 

 better, provided we do not invest too large an 

 amount of our available capital in their production, 

 just as some of our farmers invest all their capital in 

 land, and leave themselves nothing with which to 

 work it. 



Another evil attendant upon summer pruning, is 

 the sudden and violent check which it gives to the 



