8 



chemical analysis of the soil and the favorable atmospherical 

 phenomena are proved capable of producing wines and raisins 

 equal, if not superior, to the most excellent productions of the 

 most favored wine-producing countries, not excepting the cele- 

 brated wines of the Johannisberg and delicious raisins of Malaga. 

 Under our present system of mining regulations andjaws, veiy 

 few of these acres will be thus cultivated until the title to the 

 same is vested in the cultivator. Their management or sale be- 

 comes a serious question of State as well as national policy. It 

 is the interest as well as the duty of the people of the State to 

 indicate to the General Government the proper policy to be 

 adopted in regard to them. It is better to take time by the 

 forelock and control and direct that policy for our own interests 

 and the best interests of the Government, than, when too late, 

 to condemn a policy which may be to the detriment of both. 

 Every de^^artment of industry is equally interested in the ques- 

 tion, for when you touch the mines with the hand of oppression 

 you oppress every other interest, and when you encourage and 

 stimulate the devolopment of the mines, you encourage and 

 stimulate every other pursuit. In this respect, if not in the ac- 

 tual investment of money, we are all miners and all cultivators 

 of the soil. A Convention, embracing all the States and Terri- 

 tories on this side of the continent, called during the ensuing 

 Summer, for the discussion of this subject, might lead to good 

 results. 



Our wine-making interest is becoming one of the greatest 

 industrial interests of the State. It excels that of any other 

 State in the Union. Yet there is not perhaps another branch of 

 industry, in regard to the practical operations of which, there is 

 so much ignorance among our people as this. The varieties of 

 grapes best adapted to wine-making in our State, or in the 

 different localities of itj the chemical properties of the soil 

 required for superior wines; the atmospherical influences of 

 different localities; the manner of planting the vine and tilling 

 the vineyard; the gathering and pressing the grape, and fer- 

 menting and after-treatment of the juice or must until it is con- 

 verted into wine — are all subjects about which our people have 

 but very little practical or satisfactory information, and upon 

 which there is prevailing, in all our agricultural communities, 

 the most lively interest and intense desire for knowledge. 



If the Board Avere to appoint some competent person as a 

 chemist to the Society, who would, under its sanction and in his 

 official character, receive and analyze for a fair compensation, to 

 be paid by the applicant, the soils of different localities, and the 

 juice of grapes grown in the different wine-growing districts, and 

 keep a careful record of his operations, to be reported to the 

 Board, and if at the same time they were to enlist in their service, 

 as Committeemen, intelligent and practical cultivators of the 



