GRAPES. CULTIVATION, SOIL, ETC. 279 



warmer and more sheltered rocks are clothed with vine- 

 yards. In all those cornfields, the stones which would 

 otherwise encumber the ground, are gathered in heaps of 

 various sizes and forms. Among these heaps of stones the 

 vines are planted, and trained over them on poles or es- 

 paliers; the effect of this arrangement being beautiful, 

 and may be mistaken for a garden, and the clumps of vines 

 for parterres. 



PAVING THE GROUND. It has been remarked, says Mr. 

 Robertson, that vines and fruit trees planted against build- 

 ings with a pavement, which prevents the ground from be- 

 ing either manured or cultivated, produce not only more 

 abundant and finer crops, but are longer lived. 



" At Thomery," says the Comte Lelieur, " the grapes 

 on the lower cordon of a vine, planted to a wall of about 

 fifteen feet high, having been injured by the drip of its 

 eaves dashing the earth of the border against them, the 

 owner paved it for the breadth of about two feet from the 

 wall. The good effects of this remedy were soon apparent, 

 not only in the preservation of the fruit from injury, but in 

 the improvement of its size and flavor ; the reflection of 

 the sun's heat from the pavement augmenting both, and 

 hastening its maturity." The growth of the vine, also, be- 

 came more moderate and regular. 



The foreign as well as native vines succeed admirably 

 in our cities ; and especially so when planted beneath pave- 

 ments, and in paved court-yards. Not being so liable, in 

 such situations, to suffer from excess of moisture, the qual- 

 ity of the fruit becomes proportionally improved, from the 

 causes already explained. 



When it is attempted to train a single vine with two or 

 more sets of cordons, proceeding at unequal heights from 

 the same vertical stem, the upper cordon becomes the su- 

 perior, and the equilibrium is destroyed ; and the lower or 

 inferior cordons languish, being robbed of their nourish- 

 ment by those above, and the tendency of the sap to pass 

 uninterruptedly upwards. 



If the position which is here assumed be correct, then 

 the ingeniously-devised system of the celebrated Mr. Cob- 

 bett must fail in practice. I will first give the outline of his 

 system, and then, by a partial demolition, or by a partial 

 inversion, and by one important alteration, this same mode 

 will be made to appear in the likeness of another and ex- 



