BRIGHT ON GRAPE CULTURE. 89 



vines every year, and still have more fruiting canes than 

 by any other plan. The number of roots is greatly in- 

 creased, and hence the wood is fully nourished and sus- 

 tained. Observe, it is not wood alone that produces 

 fruit, but roots. By our system we double and treble 

 the number of grape roots in a border, and hence have 

 a vastly increased source of supply for our fruit. The 

 ordinary system, we arc quite convinced, taxes the roots 

 too severely, and hence you have too frequently, a large 

 quantity of poor, immature fruit. Under this system, 

 we have plenty of roots, and an increased number of 

 vines, and manage so as to let them do all they are able, 

 and no more. We concentrate, as before observed, the 

 whole strength of the vine upon a small quantity of 

 fruit, near the ground, giving to each vine all it can 

 perfect, and the result is larger bunches and finer fruit, 

 of higher flavor, and a larger and surer crop on the 

 same space of ground. 



The rest from fruiting which the vines obtain, under 

 this system, every other year, does much to keep them in 

 a healthy state, and does not exhaust their resources for 

 forming fruit so rapidly. It is a sort of fallow, giving 

 time for the collection and elaboration of the elements 

 of fruit, for the ensuing season, which may almost be 

 supposed to be drawn from the earth and the atmos- 

 phere, during this season of rest, and stored up in the 

 cells and tissues of the vine, for future use. Or, if this 

 be too fimciful an idea, unsustained by vegetable phy- 

 siology, or practical science, still we may say that the 



