Ho American Grape-Growing. 



all resembling that of its original locality ; and, lo ! it does not feel at 

 home ; its cultivators here cannot see the excellences which its originator 

 claimed for it ; they put it down as an imposition, and call its disseminator 

 a humbug and cheat. This is one instance. Another grape is sent out, 

 with no very great pretensions, except that it is hardy and healthy. It 

 travels, and finds a more congenial climate and soil, and develops qualities 

 of which those who have seen it only under unfavorable circumstances 

 can form no idea. It is tried for wine in its new home, and makes an 

 excellent article : its new friends claim for it a reputatioii as a wine-grape ; 

 but those who cultivate it under unfavorable circumstances scorn the idea 

 of that grape making a drinkable wine ; ridicule those who gi\e but their 

 actual experience, and call them humbugs and swindlers. These are in- 

 stances of two extremes. Do you wish examples ? You have them at once 

 in Dr. Grant's lona and the Concord. For the first, its originator and a 

 few friends claim that it combines all the excellences of the native and 

 foreign varieties ; is healthy, hardy, and productive. We will grant them, 

 for the sake of argument, that it is all they claim for it, with them : but we 

 also knoiv here that the lona will not succeed ; that it is subject here to every 

 disease the grape is heir to ; and we think that it will not aftbrd us a great 

 deal of satisfaction to grow a grape of very fine quality, when we can get 

 i)nly a few scattering berries of it to ripen, and the balance is swept away 

 by rot, mildew, and sun-scald. Now let us look at the Concord. Its 

 merits at the East and North are only that it is hardy and healthy every- 

 where, is showy, and a good market-fruit. Its pulp there is tough and acid, 

 its flavor repugnant to many. No one would think of making a good wine 

 out of it there. But, as it travels farther West and South, it ripens more 

 thoroughly, its acid pulp dissolves, our warmer sun develops more sugar in 

 ir, its flavor becomes more delicate, we make wine of it which can justly 

 be called very good, and its yield is all that can be wished. Is it surpris- 

 ing, then, that it should become the " grape of the million," and that hun- 

 dreds of acres are planted every year ? Yet those who have tasted it only 

 at the East turn up their noses in supreme contempt at the " uncultivated 

 tastes of those Western people," and think, because we contend that the 

 Concord is a good grape, and makes good wine, we are to be classed among 

 the semi-barbarians, and do not know what a good grape is. 



