INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. . 13 



accomplished by good grape-growers. Many have been 

 prevented from commencing by seeing the many fail- 

 ures that have occurred, the small number of successful 

 cases, and the hitherto almost general " say," that it is 

 absolutely necessary in all cases to have fire heat. But 

 we are dawning upon a new era in these respects, and the 

 alacrity and determined enthusiasm with which many have 

 now come into, and others who are beginning to enter the 

 field, will go far towards dispelling these fears, and will 

 eventually drive out prejudice. No fruit-bearing plant 

 will give greater satisfaction than the grape-vine, and 

 nothing horticultural will continue to prosper without it. 

 All that is wanted are a few right ideas, and the writer 

 has done his best to discharge his duty, feeling convinced 

 that ere long the grape-house will be considered as neces- 

 sary an adjunct to an estate, however small, as at present 

 is a peach-orchard. 



Botanists disagree with respect to the classifying of the 

 genus vitis, some making the species very numerous, and 

 others only dividing it into well-marked specialities, thereby 

 simplifying and rendering the differences more distinct. 

 There are some men so fond of dividing and subdividing 

 nature's distinctions according to their own fickle whims 

 and fancies, that, were we always to follow them, it would 

 take a lifetime to BEGIN to understand their abstract con- 

 nections ; and as these individuals have in many cases 

 become authors, and consequently are referred to as au- 

 thority, there is some apology for the novice wandering 

 in the maze of misunderstanding which they have to some 

 extent established. Such men ought to take a course of 

 practical lessons in hybridization, and see the results, be 

 fore publishing their manuscripts, when they would dis 

 cover that many of their so-called species are no more 

 distinct than some of the varieties which may be artifi- 



