CLIMATE. 



CLIMATE. 



voured, and more numerous roots in Carolina, 

 where it never flowers, than in the West Indies, 

 la the latter place this plant runs wild, covers 

 the whole face of the earth with its vines, and 

 is so taken up in making foliage, that the root 

 becomes neglected, and is small and woody. 

 In order to have the onion in perfection, it 

 must grow through two years, swelling all the 

 time its bulbs. In the south, however, it seeds 

 in one year, and before it has made much bulb. 

 Beets, carrots, parsnips, turnips, radishes, and 

 other roots, are equally affected by a hot sun, 

 and scarcely worth cultivating far to the south. 

 They all fructify before they have formed per- 

 fect roots, and make foliage at the expense of 

 their bulbs ; hence they will always be articles 

 of commerce ; the south will have to depend 

 upon the north for them. 



"The salad plants are in like manner af- 

 fected by climate, and give further proofs of 

 our assumption. Cabbages, lettuces, endive, 

 cellery, spinage, plants whose leaves only are 

 eat, to protect their germs from cold (through 

 a kind of instinct), wrap them ug in leaves, 

 which form heads, and render many of their 

 other parts tender and crisp for use. These 

 leaves, thus protected, are not only tender, but 

 more nutritious, because their growth has been 

 slow and their juices well digested. In the 

 south, a relaxing sun lays open the very buds 

 of such plants, gives a toughness and thinness 

 to the leaves, and they are too unsubstantial 

 for animal support, because of such quick and 

 rapid developement. 



"The delicious and pulpy fruits are, in a 

 still more striking way, illustrative of our prin- 

 ciple. The peach, nectarine, plum, apple, 

 cherry, currant, gooseberry, apricot, and many 

 other such families, are not in perfection in 

 the south. It is in Pennsylvania, Virginia, 

 Maryland, Jersey, and in the north of Europe, 

 that we enjoy them, although, originally, they 

 came from pLaces near the tropics. The peach 

 of the Carolinas is full of larvce, gum, and 

 knots, and too stringy and forced to be juicy 

 and flavoured. The apple of the south is too 

 acerb to be either eaten or preserved. The 

 plums, apricots, cherries, currants, goose- 

 berries, &c., will not even mature until we go 

 far north. All the trees which bear these de- 

 licious fruits will grow luxuriantly in the south, 

 make much foliage and wood, with but little 

 pulp, and that unsavoury. The kernel in the 

 one-seeded fruit seems to be the first object of 

 nature in southern climes : that becomes 

 strong, oily, and enlarged ; and one of the 

 peach family has so entirely neglected the 

 pulp, that it has only a husky matter around 

 the kernel, as the almond. The changeable- 

 ness of the weather in the south, in the spring 

 season, throws plants off their guard; the 

 frosts attendant on those changes destroy the 

 young fruit; and it is only one year in three 

 that the crop hits at all. The desiccated or 

 dried state of these fruits enables us to enjoy 

 them through the year; but in the south their 

 acidity carries them into fermentation or de- 

 composition before they can be divested of 

 their aqueous parts. The climate of the south 

 is equally against converting them into cider, 

 or any other fermented liquor, because the 

 43 



heat forces their compressed juice so rapidly 

 into an active fermentation, that it cannot 

 easily be checked until it passes into vinegar. 

 For the same reason distillation goes on badly 

 in hot climates, and cannot be checked long 

 enough at the proper point to give much alco- 

 hol: and whether we aim to enjoy the delicious 

 freshness of these fruits themselves, sip the 

 nectarin of their juices, refresh ourselves with 

 their fermented beverage, stimulate our hearts 

 with their brandies and cordials, or feast 

 through the winter upon the dried or preserved 

 stores of their fruits, we are continually 

 balked by the severity of a southern climate, 

 and for such enjoyment must look to the north. 



"The melons are always affected by too 

 great a degree of heat, even though their vines 

 flourish so much in southern latitudes. The 

 forcing sun hurries them on to maturity before 

 they have attained much size, or acquired that 

 rich saccharine and aromatic flavour for which 

 they are so much esteemed. The cantelope- 

 meloh will rot, or have its sides baked by a hot 

 sun, before it is fully formed ; and the water- 

 melon is always woody, dry, and devoid of its 

 peculiar sweetness and richness in the south. 

 Vines have been known to run one hundred 

 feet, and bear no melon. It is in Philadelphia, 

 and its neighbourhood, and in similar latitudes, 

 that the markets are loaded with delicious me- 

 lons of all sorts, whose flavour so much refresh 

 and delight us. It is there, near their northern 

 limit, that we cultivate them with such uniform 

 success. 



"The orange, strictly a tropical plant, is 

 more juicy, large, and delicious, at St. Augus- 

 tine (Florida), than at Havana ; and fruiterers, 

 in order to recommend an orange, will say that 

 it is from some place out of the tropics. In 

 the West Indies, the pulp of the orange is 

 spungy, badly filled with juice, and has too 

 much of a forced flavour to be pleasant. The 

 hot-house forcers of Europe, or at Rome, an- 

 ciently at first produced bad fruit ; too dry, too 

 small, and without flavour ; because they over- 

 acted. They have lately found out that fact, 

 and now the productions of the hot-houses of 

 London, Paris, &c., astonish and delight us 

 with the quantity and excellence of the fruit. 

 They have found'out that gradual and uniform 

 heat is the desideratum ; countervailing the 

 cold, rather than imparting much heat. Fruit 

 thus produced is pronounced better than any 

 grown in the natural way, however perfect the 

 climate. 



" The juices of the grape are best matured for 

 wine near the northern limit of their growth. On 

 the Rhine, in Hungary, the sides of the Alps, 

 and in other elevated or northern situations, the 

 wine is strongest, richest, and most esteemed. 

 The French wines rank before the Spanish 

 and Italian ; and in no southern country of 

 Europe or Africa, except Madeira, where ele- 

 vation makes the difference, is the wine in 

 much repute. The grapes of France are more 

 delicious for the table than those of Spain or 

 Madeira. In the southern part of the United 

 States, the excess of heat and moisture blights 

 the grape to such an extent that all attempts 

 have failed in its cultivation. The grape-vine, 

 however, whether wild or cultivated, grows 

 2 F 337 



