20 THE EVOLUTION OP OUR NATIVE FRUITS 



eral information , the extensive usefulness of that 

 gentleman in having in 1801 supplied Kentucky 

 with fifteen hundred cuttings, Pennsylvania with 

 fifteen hundred, and other quantities to vineyards 

 established in Connecticut, New-York, New-Jersey, 

 Maryland, Virginia, and the State of Ohio, from 

 which numerous branches have since issued, awake 

 fresh sentiments of respect for so useful a character. 

 Such men merit a token of respect from every state 

 in the Union." 



The attempt to grow the Old World wine grapes 

 out of doors in eastern America was continued until 

 twenty -five or thirty years ago ; in fact, the effort is 

 even now made by an occasional amateur. Nicholas 

 Longworth of whom we shall yet have much to 

 say wrote, in 1845, of his endeavors in this direc- 

 tion: "I have for thirty years experimented on the 

 foreign grape, both for the table and for wine. 

 In the acclimation of plants, I do not believe ; for 

 the White Sweet Water does not succeed as well 

 with me, as it did thirty years since. I obtained 

 a large variety of French grapes from Mr. Loubat, 

 many years since. They were from the vicinity of 

 Paris and Bordeaux. From Madeira, I obtained six 

 thousand vines of their best wine grapes. Not one 

 was found worthy of cultivation in this latitude, 

 and were rooted from the vineyards. As a last ex- 

 periment, I imported seven thousand vines from the 

 mountains of Jura, in the vicinity of Salins, in 

 France. * * * But after a trial of five years, all 

 have been thrown away. : * * If we intend cul- 

 tivating the grape for wine, we must rely on our 

 native grapes, and new varieties raised from their 



