30 THE EVOLUTION OF OUR NATIVE FRUITS 



of the Ohio. These details are sufficient to give a 

 very different idea of the state of the pretended flour- 

 ishing vines of Kentucky, from that which may have 

 been formed on the pompous accounts of them pub- 

 lished some months ago in the public papers." 



The subscribers to the vineyard company soon 

 became disheartened and failed to meet their engage- 

 ments, the available stock was used in paying for the 

 labor which had been -employed in the plantation, and 

 the further prosecution of the enterprise rested upon 

 three brothers Dufour, the other members of the 

 colony having sought a new location on the banks of 

 the Ohio, in Indiana. Every effort was made to in- 

 crease the stock of the Cape and Madeira grapes, the 

 only varieties which had escaped the fatal sickness. 

 John James Dufour returned to Europe in 1806, and 

 left the establishment in the hands of his younger 

 brothers. In his absence the second war with Eng- 

 land broke out, and he was delayed in returning until 

 1816. He found the "vineyard grown up with briars." 

 The brothers had become discouraged, chiefly because 

 one crop had been destroyed by a frosty spring, and 

 "had abandoned the place to an American tenant, 

 who supposed we had a bad title to the land." The 

 intruder was ejected by due process of law. John 

 James had appointed his half-brother, John Francis, 

 his attorney on the 15th of January, 1806. The col-, 

 ony was at this time practically abandoned, although 

 all the land did not pass out of the family until at 

 least twenty -five years later. Upon returning to 

 America, John James Dufour wrote "The American 

 Vine Dresser's Guide, being a treatise on the cul- 

 tivation of the vine, and the process of wine making. 



