PROPAGATING HOUSE. 41 



CHAPTER Y. 



PROPAGATING HOUSE. 



PERFECTION should be our aim in every department of 

 horticulture, and especially in the cultivation of the grape, 

 and while it is not to be expected that every vine will be 

 made to appear as regular and systematic as represented 

 in engravings, still that is the point to be aimed at, and 

 though we may fail with some, it is possible to very nearly 

 reach it with all. So it is in constructing propagating 

 houses. It is not expected that every one will have the 

 means at command, nor would it always be expedient if 

 they had, to go to the expense of building an extensive 

 propagating house, unless it were desirable to produce a 

 large number of vines, and for a number of years in suc- 

 cession. The size of the house will depend entirely upon 

 the number of vines to be grown. If only a few thousand 

 are to be produced, then only a small structure will be 

 required ; for the best vines, or the best results, are not 

 always produced in the most expensive houses. Many a 

 careful propagator annually produces his few thousand of 

 superior vines with only a small lean-to house, heated with 

 a common brick furnace and flue, and these perhaps of his 

 own make. And while this same propagator might tell 

 you that he would prefer, as a matter of convenience, a 

 propagating house with all the modern improvements, still 

 he would scarcely admit that the plants produced in his 

 small, cheap way were any more liable to disease, or in 

 any way inferior to those grown in the most elegant and 

 expensive house. 



