DESCRIPTION OF VARIETIES. 239 



ratus, he can do good work with one of the common 

 brass syringes such as florists often use in their green- 

 houses, for applying kerosene emulsion and other liquid 

 insecticides. 



CHAPTER XXI. 



DESCRIPTION OF VARIETIES. 



Of the one hundred and thirty varieties named and 

 briefly described in the first edition of this work (1864), 

 scarcely more than a dozen can be admitted into the 

 present list of varieties worthy of cultivation. Nearly 

 all of the others have either become obsolete, or merely 

 retained, in some of the larger collections of native 

 grapes. But new varieties have been raised in immense 

 numbers, of late years, and it would not now be at all 

 difficult to double my former list, and then not exhaust 

 the names of highly extolled favorites to be found in 

 nurserymen's catalogues, and of those who make the 

 propagation of the grape a specialty. The ephemeral 

 life of a large proportion of the older sorts warns me not 

 to place too much confidence in the new ; and yet it 

 must be admitted that the cultivators of this fruit have 

 learned much by observation and experience during the 

 past three decades ; consequently, they are better able to 

 judge of the real merits of the new and untried varieties 

 than ever before. That this experience is producing 

 excellent results is quite apparent, in the improved flavor 

 of some of the newer varieties disseminated within the 

 past few years, by those who make a specialty of raising 

 seedlings ; for they have learned that cultivators are 

 seeking something better than those which they have 

 previously possessed, and if such cannot be had it would 

 be folly to attempt to make a change. Some few of the 



