402 Select Plants for Industrial Culture 



over 3,000 feet at Montebamboli. Rezier notes a plant, bearing about 

 4,000 bunches of grapes annually at Besanon (Regel). A single 

 plant of " Black Hamburg " under glass at Rockhampton, England, 

 bore annually 900-1,000 Ibs. of grapes (Davis). A vine of enormous 

 dimensions at Hampton-Court has also gained wide celebrity. In 

 Italy the establishing of vine-plantations on ordinary culture-land is 

 regarded as enhancing the value of the latter four or five fold, and 

 elsewhere often even more (whereas cereal-land is apt to deteriorate), 

 provided that vine-diseases can be kept off. The imports of wine 

 into the United Kingdom in 1884 amounted to about 15 million 

 gallons, worth more than 5,000,000, of which only a very small 

 proportion came from British colonies. 



The Corinthian variety, producing the currants of commerce, also 

 thrives well in some districts of extra-tropic Australia, where with 

 raisins its fruit may become a staple-article of export beyond home- 

 consumption. The Sultana-variety is not to be much pruned; the 

 bunches. when gathered are dipped in an alkaline liquid obtained from 

 wood-ashes, to which a little olive oil is added, to expedite drying, 

 which is effected in about a week (G. Maw). The produce of Sultana- 

 raisins fluctuates from 7 to 30 cwt. per acre. The plant is best reared 

 on limestone- formations. In Greece the average-yield of ordinary 

 raisins is about 2,000 Ibs. per acre (Simmonds). Great Britain im- 

 ported in 1884 about 60,000 tons of currants and 25^000 tons of raisins, 

 nearly all for home-consumption. Dr. W. Hamm, of Vienna, has 

 issued a Vine-map of Europe, indicating the distribution of the 

 different varieties and the principal sources of the various sorts of 

 wine. The writer would now merely add, that the preservation of 

 the grapes in a fresh state, according to M. Charmeux's method, and 

 the sundry modes of effecting the transit of ripe grapes to long dis- 

 tances, ought to be turned to industrial advantage. The pigment of 

 the dark wine-berries is known as racemic acid. The juice contains 

 along with tartaric acid also grape-acid. All these chemically defined 

 substances have uses of their own in art and science. It might be 

 worthy of a trial, how far the Grape-vine can be grafted on such other 

 species, not American, of the extensive genus Vitis, as may not be 

 attacked by the destructive Pemphigus or Phylloxera. Irrespective 

 of sulphur, borax has also latterly been recommended against the 

 "Oidium-disease. Professor Monnier, of Geneva, has introduced the 

 very expansive sulphurous anhydrous acid gas against the Phylloxera. 

 The cultivation of insecticidal herbs to check the ingress of Phylloxera 

 should be more extensively tried, as such plants might ward off the 

 insect at all events in its wingless state. Dr. Herman Behr suggests 

 for the mitigation of this plague the ignition of wood near vineyards, 

 when the insect is on its wings, as all such insects seek fires, and 

 succumb in them largely, the attraction to the fiery light being 

 greatest when the sky is overcast, or when the nights are without 

 moonlight. Mr. Leacock, in Madeira, applies a coating of a sticky 

 solution of resin in oil of turpentine advantageously to the roots 

 of Vines affected by Phylloxera. None of the remedies hitherto 



