IV PREFACE. 



unknown, the rainless summers, when no showers are 

 expected from May until September, allow nearly all of 

 the crop to ripen every year. Even in the unusually cool 

 summer of 1882, with early and abundant rains in Sep- 

 tember, the crops ripened sufficiently to make a fair wine, 

 perhaps only the more agreeable because not too heavy. 

 These favorable climatic conditions simplify the culture 

 and training of the vine, the gathering of the fruit, and 

 the operations in wine making. Gallizing and Petioliz- 

 ing became superfluous, and would not even pay, as 

 grape juice is cheaper than sugar and water would be. 

 In this climate it becomes possible that one man can own 

 and superintend hundreds of acres of vineyard, and that 

 a fair wholesale price for the wine, when three months 

 old, is from twenty to thirty cents per gallon. At this 

 rate it pays the producer well, as it costs him on the 

 average about twenty dollars per annum per acre to cul- 

 tivate the grapes and make the wine ; and five hundred 

 gallons per acre is considered an average yield. That, 

 under all these favorable circumstances, California must 

 become the first grape-growing State in the Union, seems 

 to be but natural, especially when we consider also the 

 raisin industry, perhaps still more profitable, and the 

 extended shipments of table grapes to the Eastern States, 

 and other sources of profit. 



But, easy as are grape culture and wine making here, 

 there is a vast field for improvement ; and nowhere else 

 perhaps are rational knowledge and proper skill more 

 needed. The very ease of the pursuit, which allowed 

 any one, even with the simplest culture and the most 

 common treatment, to raise a fair crop and make a drink- 

 able wine, has led many, in fact a large majority, to em- 

 bark in grape growing who knew but little about it, and 

 did not try to learn more. They followed the pursuit 

 negligently and mechanically, without proper study and 

 observation. The results were, the culture of varieties 



