The St. Louis Fair. 



808 



the want of proper space, by convert- 

 ing the old arena into a spacious well 

 adapted hall for the exhibition of flow- 

 ers, fruits, and the products of field 

 and garden, the disphiy in these de- i 

 partraents was, this year, far better j 

 than heretofore ; and but for the fact 

 that peaches and pears were an entire 

 failure and the apple crop very poor, 

 tliroughout the "West, the space allotted 

 to fruits would still not have been 

 sufficiently large. 



But our special branch, the grape, 

 was well represented. There we saw ! 

 the first exposition of California fruit. 

 The grapes were named (some incor- 

 rectly, we think.) as ''Purple Damasc," ; 

 *' AYhite Muscat," '' Flam Tokay," and j 

 especially the famous "Mission Grape." 

 In size of both bunch and berries they 

 were fully equal to the best specimens of 

 grapes grown under glass, we ever saw, 

 but they were more fleshy than juicy — 

 and even considered as table grapes, are 

 more ornamental than useful ; none of 

 them should be called wine grapes. 

 These, together with some pears of 

 enormous size, especially Vicar of 

 Winkfield, weighing one and a half 

 pound each, and also some pome- 

 granates, were from 11. M. Crandall, 

 Auburn, Placer county, Cal. 



There were but two bunches of grapes 

 grown under glass on exhibition, and we 

 have seen finer specimens before, though 

 these were very creditable, the more 

 so, as they came Irom Wisconsin ; a 

 loud rebuke to our wealthy St. Louis 

 men, who either have no graperies, or 

 else deem the public not worthy of see- 

 ing the fruit the}' raise, or the fruit not 

 worthy to be seen. In Missouri grapes, 

 grown in the field, the exhibition was 

 much inferior to that at the Hermann 



fair. The prineii)al exhibitors were 

 Messrs. Isidor Bush & Son, 1<> whom 

 nearly all the first premiums in this de- 

 partment were justly awaided, for the 

 largest and best collection of grapes ; 

 for the best six bunches of Norton's 

 Virginia grapes ; the best six l»unche& 

 of Catawba ; the best and lai'gest num- 

 ber of bunches on one vine; the best 

 collection of pears, etc. Tiie earlier 

 varieties had been kept in the fruit 

 house (Nice's patent,) for that pur- 

 pose, but we think that they would 

 have preserved better on the vines. 

 The largest six bunches Concord ex- 

 hibited, the finest specimens we have 

 ever seen, wei-c i-aised by Mrs. Chas. 

 Beardslee, (Mr. Kuhle, gardener,) on 

 Dr. Claggett's farm, near Kirkwood. 

 Mr. Mason, of same place, had even a 

 larger number of varieties on exhibi- 

 tion than Busli i!t Son, but they were 

 inferior in specimens, and less valuable 

 varieties and thus were awarded the 

 second premium. Tiiere was not a sin- 

 gle variety on exhibition that we did 

 not see before. In vain did we look 

 for the Croton, 8enasqua, or any of 

 Arnold's Hybrids. This may be partly 

 due to the fact that no premium is 

 offered for the best new grape seedling, 

 and j'Ct the directors of the JSt. Louis 

 Agricultural Association dare to say 

 they "feel assured it is the most com- 

 plete and thorough list of premiums 

 ever devised." They may probably also 

 leel assured that their awarding com- 

 \ mittees are selected with the greatest 

 I care from among the best judges for 

 the respective branches ; but we beg 

 leave to dirter, so much so that their 

 j awards have but little value. It is this 

 bad selection of awarding committees 

 which has justly caused our friends,. 



