14 Grapes and Grape-Culture. 



been tested in Missouri the past season as a wine-grape, and found to 

 produce a white wine of very fine quality; the must indicating 92" by 

 QEchsle's scale. 



There are some other varieties which I am inclined to think may also 

 become generally popular by reason of their possessing many of the cos- 

 mopolitan characteristics of the Concord and Hartford, with somewhat bet- 

 ter fruit. Among these are Underhill's Seedling, and some of Rogers's 

 Hybrids, such as Nos. 3, 4, 5, 9, and some others. None of these are of 

 very high character, and, though some time before the public, do not seem 

 to have been so extensively grown as to warrant more positive assertions. 

 I cannot but express the hope, however, that the time will come when 

 something decidedly better may be produced, equally adapted to general 

 cultivation, and which may take the place of such in this and other classes 

 as are now tolerated by refined tastes only where better cannot be had, or 

 are too difiicult of production. 



As tj'pes of a class of grapes which seem suited only to special soils and 

 locations may be named Catawba, Diana, and lona, among red grapes ; 

 Rebecca, Maxatawny, and Allen's White Hybrid, among white grapes ; 

 and Adirondac, Herbemont, and its kindred, Lenoir, Lincoln, and Alvey, 

 among the black ones. Of these, the most extensively planted is the 

 Catawba, which in former years was very popular wherever it would even 

 partially mature. But it is found too late for northern localities, except 

 a few favored situations where the presence of large bodies of water, or 

 other natural causes, so equalize the temperature, and prevent frost, as to 

 prolong the season beyond its natural period. The islands in the south- 

 western portion of Lake Erie, and the southern shore of the same lake for 

 a limited distance inland, are quite remarkable in this respect, having a 

 longer season, and ripening grapes that cannot be matured a hundred 

 miles southward in the interior. But, for several years past, the vineyards 

 both of the islands and the Lake Shore have suffered to a serious extent 

 from the disease known as grape-rot ; in some instances, in old vineyards 

 which have been enfeebled by previous over-bearing, resulting in almost 

 utter failure. This malady has also proved so destructive in many of the 

 older Catawba vineyards in Southern Ohio, about the region of Cincinnati, 

 that they have been abandoned entirely, or replanted with other varieties, 



