104 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



the gardens and orchards of the opulent and wealthy. Then, 

 with a few exceptions, the fruits were of a common or ordi- 

 nary quality. Now, we have collcctious of the apple and pear 

 consisting of hundreds of varieties, many of which possess 

 all the characteristics of a first-rate fruit, and instead of here 

 and there an orchard on the Atlantic and a few varieties for 

 the summer season, we now have thousands of orchards and 

 gardens with fruits adapted to every section of our country, 

 and fruit for almost every month in the year. Then, the culti- 

 vation of the grape had received scarcely any attention, except 

 its culture under glass. It is not fifty years since the Isabella 

 and Catawba were brought to notice. Now, we have numer- 

 ous varieties raised from seed, and hundreds of vineyards 

 scattered all over our land. And so great have been the im- 

 provements in packing, and the facilities of transportation, 

 that our markets are supplied with this delicious fruit, even 

 to the winter months. Nor is this all : the juice of the grape, 

 the manufacture of wine, has not only become an article of 

 commerce, but rivals in quality, and finds a market in, the old 

 wine countries of Europe. What Avould Mr. Longworth, of 

 Cincinnati, the great pioneer in American wine culture, have 

 said, when planting the cuttings of the Catawba and Isabella 

 grapes in 1829, if he could have foreseen that the cultivation 

 of the grape would at this time have been extended through 

 twenty-five degrees of latitude, and from ocean to ocean ; 

 that European varieties, Avithout the aid of glass, would be 

 grown in California with as much ease as in the most favored 

 portions of the globe ; that the grape would be as common in 

 our markets as the apple, and sometimes sold almost at as 

 low a price ; that the products of wine would exceed ten mil- 

 lions of gallons annually ; that a sale of champagne wine to 

 the amount of forty thousand dollars should be made for ex- 

 portation to the wine regions of Europe ; and still more re- 

 markable, that this wine, the Great Western, of the Pleasant 

 Valley Wine Company, should bear ofi", triuoiphantly, a first 

 prize for champagne wines, at the World's Great Exhibition 

 in Vienna the present year. 



Nor is this progress more wonderful than the improvement 

 and advancement which has taken place in the cultivation of 

 our small fruits. Then, with the exception of two or three 



