66 FRUIT GARDEN. 



application of artificial heat, ripe grapes in great per- 

 fection are produced in .many, vineries -during every 

 mantli in the year, in endless succession. 



The productiveness of the grape-vine may be increas- 

 ed to an almost unlimited extent, an example of which 

 is furnished in the much celebrated Black Hamburg vine 

 in the grapery attached to the royal gardens at Hamp- 

 ton Court, which, in a single season, has produced 2200 

 bunches averaging a pound each, making in all nearly 

 a ton.* Another vine in England, at Valentine in 

 Essex, has produced 2000 bunches of nearly the same 

 average weight. It occupies above 147 square yards, 

 W'hilst that at Hampton Court is spread over 160 square 

 yards, one of its branches measuring 114 feet in length. 

 Where the climate and other circumstances are favor- 

 able, the age attained by grape-vines is almost unlimit- 

 ed. Pliny mentions one 600 years old and still bearing 

 in his time. 



Most of those who have attempted the cultivation in 

 the United States of foreign grapes- i?i the open air 

 have met with discouraging results. The White Sweet- 

 water and Black Hamburg are almost the only varie- 

 ties which will give crops in the open air in the Southern 

 States, or in sheltered situations and gardens in the 

 city of Philadelphia. 



Dr. B. T. Underbill, of New York, states that after 

 having sunk thousands of dollars in attempts to raise 

 the best foreign varieties of grapes in the open air, he 

 has abandoned the project as visionary, and entirely 



* This vine is sometimes called even in books sl Bed Hamburg. 

 But there is, in fact, no such particular variety of grape as the 

 lied Hamburg, that so called being strictly the Black Hamburg 

 imperfectly ripened. 



