64 KEEPING GRAPES AFTER THEY ARE RIPE. 



where we began cutting black Hamburgs in August. 

 This house is 110 feet long, 11 feet high, and 11 feet 

 wide, and has been referred to already as having been 

 planted in 1858. It is a common lean-to house, built 

 to serve the double purpose of growing figs on the 

 back wall, a vine up each rafter and one half-way up 

 the centre of each sash, the sashes being 5 feet wide. 

 The ventilation is by an opening sash to the north 

 on the top of the wall, and the front sashes open out- 

 wards in the usual way by lever and rod. The cost 

 of this house, including boiler arid two rows of 4 -inch 

 pipe along the front, was under 200, and at Christmas 

 last we had four hundred bunches of Lady Downes and 

 West's St Peter's grapes hanging in it, representing a 

 commercial value little short of its original cost. 



In order that grapes may keep well, it is necessary 

 that they should be well ripened by the end of Sep- 

 tember, and not grown in a wet border; nor should 

 the internal atmosphere of the house be kept loaded 

 with moisture. What is required in grapes to keep 

 well is a firm, fleshy berry, not one full of water. The 

 bunches should have the berries well thinned out, more 

 so than in the case of grapes that are to be used 

 shortly after they are ripe. Long, tapering bunches 

 keep better than broad-shouldered ones, as the berries 

 in the centres of the latter are apt to damp off and 

 destroy the bunch before it is observed. As soon as 

 the grapes are thoroughly ripe, the night temperature 

 should be lowered to 50 till the leaves fall off or ripen, 

 when they should be removed carefully by hand from 

 the vines. After this date the fire-heat should never 

 exceed 45, nor fall below 35 at night ; and in damp, 



