42 MICROBES, FERMENTS, AND MOULDS. 



vegetable. Yet we should rather be surprised that 

 the vine has not been completely destroyed by the 

 combination of such diverse scourges, and that it has 

 effectually resisted them in several regions of France. 

 When we consider that for long years the same hoary 

 old stocks have been required to produce grapes 

 without truce or mercy, and often without taking 

 pains to supply to them by a fitting manure the 

 nourishment which is withdrawn from them by the 

 fructification of the grape, we shall be less astonished 

 at the decadence of our vineyards. And, indeed, 

 enlightened minds ascribe the attacks of these 

 numerous parasites to the weakness and exhaustion 

 of our vines, rather than to any accidental cause, such 

 as an importation from without. 



The principal remedy may, therefore, be found in 

 restoring the strength of the vine by the planting of 

 young suckers, and still more of seedlings. Instead 

 of attempting to introduce foreign plants, which it 

 may not be easy to acclimatize, and which will 

 certainly be less valuable than the vines we have 

 lost, it would surely be better to seek to regenerate 

 our indigenous kinds by crossing the cultivated stocks 

 with wild vines, or else, as Millardet suggests, by 

 crossing them with each other. The attempt might 

 also be made to graft the stocks from Bordeaux and 

 Burgundy on wild or American vines, which offer 

 a better resistance to the attacks of the phylloxera. 



