NOMENCLATURE OF GRAPES. 



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vines than of fruit-bearing ones, whose farina fecundans, 

 mixing with the air and winds, is carried to a great distance to 

 the female organs of hermaphrodite flowers. I shall now give 

 my opinion of the distinct species or established races from 

 which all the varieties or mules have originated. 



1st. The Common Blue Grape, or Bunch Grape, Vitis 

 sylvestris, or V. occidentalis. This is the most common grape. 

 The acini or berries are of the oblate figure, of various sizes 

 on different plants, and of various tastes. Some are sweet 

 and pleasant enough, having a musky flavour. They are 

 nearly as large as the Burgundy grape : are black when ripe, 

 having a glaucous bloom, like the damson plum. The leaves 

 of this species are large : their under surface covered with a 

 clay-coloured down or pubescence. They are tri-lobed, each 

 lobe subdivided or dentated. Some varieties have very deep 

 sinuosities, almost touching the mid-rib. 



2d. Fox-Grape, Vitis wlpina, ofBartram, V. foliis cordatis 

 subtrilobis, dentatis; subtus iomentosis, Linn. Spec, plant. 

 V. vulpina dicta Virginiana alba ; Plucku. aim. 392. Vitis 

 vulpina dicta acinis peramplis purpureis in racemo paucis, 

 sapore fatido et ingrato praditis, cute crassa carnosa, Clayt. 

 n. 696. The last part of the description is decisive ; every 

 word true when applied to our fox-grape of Pennsylvania ; 

 and Dr. Clayton's authority should be relied on, as he was a 

 native of Virginia, spent his life there, and was an excellent 

 botanist. The leaves of the fox-grape are large and lobated, 

 not much unlike those of the common bunch grape, but not so 

 deeply sinuated and toothed ; their under surface thickly 

 covered with a yellow pubescence or down ; the fruit bunches 

 short, having few acini or berries on them, but these few are 

 large, and of an oblate figure. Some are as large as a musket- 

 ball, others are of different sizes, and the colours are black, 

 red, purple, green and white, when ripe. All possess a strong 

 rancid smell and taste, have a coriaceous skin, and a tough jelly- 

 like pulp or tegument which encloses the seeds. Between this 

 nucleus and the skin is a sweet lively juice, but a little acerb 

 or stinging to the mouth if pressed hard in eating them. There 



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