296 Culture of the Grape in Cities. 



effect this arrangement by training the standards obliquely to a point about 

 a foot below the places which they are to assume, as is seen in the case of 

 numbers three, seven, eleven, five, and nine. If the standards are so se- 

 cured to the wires as to rise perpendicularly the last foot of their course, 

 this will suffice ; but, if the obliquity be continued quite to the point of 

 separation, the sap, unless retarded as suggested below, will enter one arm 

 so much more freely than the other, as almost, of necessity, to involve a 

 serious inequality of the size and strength of the arms, and ultimately the 

 absorption of the entire vigor of the vine by the favored one. 



Looking now at these vines as presented in the illustration, v/e see, that, 

 while the first and third courses of the trellis have been fully occupied by 

 the vines assigned to them, spaces of five feet remain uncovered at the 

 extremities of the second and fourth courses. A special provision is 

 requisite for these. Vine number one is made to extend one of its arms 

 along the vacant space at the left of the second course ; while its other 

 arm is sent four feet higher, to occupy the corresponding position in the 

 fourth course ; and, at the other end of the row, number tv.'elve performs a 

 similar service. It is true that tliis arrangement ignores a law of the grape 

 which causes a tendency of the sap to the higher portions of the vine ; 

 and consequently the lower arms would, after a while, be robbed for the 

 aggrandizement of the upper. This result will ultimately be reached, but 

 may a long time be delayed. In the spring, we may attach the lower arms 

 of numbers one and twelve to the trellis, and leave the upper ones hang- 

 ing down until the buds on the lower have burst, and made a growth of 

 four or five inches : the start thus gained will be maintained a good por- 

 tion of the season ; and when the upper arms, in course of time, have be- 

 come unduly developed, we can cut off the vines below the top of the 

 : standards, and in the second season thereafter have new arms burdened 

 with fruit. 



With plenty of space, the trellis may be continued indefinite!}^, in sec- 

 tions of ten feet or five ; all the interior vines extending their arms hori- 

 zontally as above described (each being in fact a duplicate of the fourth 

 vine preceding it), and the two vines at the extremities assuming the appear- 

 ance of numbers one and twelve. But enough has been said on training, 

 and I must hasten to a close. 



