PEACHES PEARS CHERRIES GRAPES. 159 



does Fox-grapes on the willows which overhang his 

 brook ; for if he does he will surely be disappointed. 



Some of our hardier and coarser Grapes the Con- 

 cord preeminent among them are grown with con- 

 siderable facility over a wide extent of our country ; 

 and many farmers, having planted them in congenial 

 soil, and tended them well throughout their infancy, 

 are rewarded by a bounteous product for two or 

 three years. Believing their suocess assured, they 

 imagine that their vines may henceforth be neglect- 

 ed, and in the course of two or three more years they 

 are often utterly ruined. I know that there are 

 wild grapes of some value, in the absence of better, 

 which thrive and bear without attention ; but I 

 do not believe that any grape which will seh 1 in 

 a market where good fruit was- ever seen, can 

 be grown north of Philadelphia but by constant 

 care and labor, or at a cost of less than five cents per 

 pound, under the most judicious and skillful treat- 

 ment. In California, and I presume in most of our 

 States south of the Potomac and Ohio, choice grapes 

 may be grown more abundantly and more cheaply. 

 Yet I think the localities are few and far between in 

 which a tun of good grapes can be grown as cheaply 

 as a tun of wheat, under the most judicious cultiva- 

 tion in either case. 



I do not mean to discourage grape-growing; on 

 the contrary, I would have every farmer, even so far 

 north as Vermont and Wisconsin, experiment cau- 

 tiously with a dozen of the most promising varieties, 



