JOHN JAMES DUPOUB 21 



seeds. If I could get my lease of life renewed for 

 twenty or thirty years, I would devote my attention 

 to the subject, and I would cross our best native 

 varieties with the best table and wine grapes of 

 Europe." 



It is unnecessary to rehearse other attempts to 

 grow the foreign grape in eastern America. All 

 efforts eventually resulted in failure. The experiment 

 has been tried upon an extended scale by many ex- 

 pert men for a period of over two centuries. We 

 shall, therefore, consider the history of another line 

 of endeavor, leaving the curious reader in ignorance, 

 for the time being, of the causes of all these dis- 

 asters. 



The First Experiment of the Dufours 



A great and well -laid attempt was finally made, in 

 Kentucky and Indiana, to establish the wine grape in 

 America, the results of which were the most far-reach- 

 ing of any single experiment. The leader of this 

 movement was John James Dufour, a Swiss. When 

 a lad, he conceived that America 

 offered a field in which to engage 

 in wine -making with profit. Later 

 in life he was imbued with the 

 feeling which was so well expressed 

 by Antill, and which has been held 

 by many another since, that good 

 wine will expel the stronger 



liquors. "Then that offspring of fire distilled 

 liquor so corrosive and acerb as its parent," he 

 writes, "which crisps the heart and maketh man mad, 

 will be left for the poor inhabitants of frozen coun- 



