10 THE GBAPE CT/LIURIST. 



botanists, but at the present uay all of the many thou- 

 sand varieties cultivated in European countries, with 

 the exception of the few introduced from America, are 

 supposed to have originated from one species, namely, 

 the Vitis vinifera, and it is not positively known which 

 one of these two thousand or more varieties is the orig- 

 inal, although it can be proved that many of them are 

 not ; it is, therefore, impossible to give a description of 

 the foreign vine so that it can be recognized by one not 

 previously acquainted with the general appearance of 

 the many varieties belonging to it. Language, however 

 skillfully applied, is often inadequate to describe to 

 others our own knowledge or impressions. For instance, 

 we may have a friend whom we wish to describe to 

 another so that he shall be able to know him among a 

 thousand ; but unless the one described has some unu- 

 sual mark to designate him, twenty may be found in the 

 thousand to answer the description exactly at least, to 

 a stranger. So it is with the foreign vine ; to those 

 who have become acquainted with both it and the native 

 species, it is an easy task to distinguish one from the 

 other, no matter how much each may vary ; but to de- 

 scribe the two so that others may learn the difference is 

 not so readily done. Foreign varieties have leaves rang- 

 ing through all the gradations of color known as green 

 so have ours ; some approach the red so do ours ; 

 many have a very shining surface, and others are downy 

 or woolly so are ours. The leaf of the European grape 

 also presents every conceivable shape, preserving, how- 

 ever, characteristics enough to be recognizable as belong- 

 ing to the grape genus. And we have one species, the 

 Labrusca, the varieties of which will match any of them 

 in shape. The young wood of many of the foreign van- 

 eties is covered with a grayish-blue bloom, said by chem- 

 ists to be wax ; this is sometimes considered a distinctive 

 mark of the foreign varieties, but our cor di folio is 



