228 PRELIMINARY REMARKS ON CULTURE. 



will ere long cause each section of our republic to respond to 

 the efforts of the others. 



The information which I have elicited on this head from 

 every part of the union, and which will form part of the matter 

 of the ensuing volume, evinces when concentrated, advances 

 so much greater than could well have been anticipated at this 

 early stage of our progress, that I doubt not it will strike with 

 amazement even the most sanguine friends of the vine. Suffice 

 it here to say, that a degree of perseverance and enthusiasm 

 seems to pervade all the votaries of this delightful pursuit, and a 

 warm and friendly interchange of views and sentiments exists 

 among them, which has been comparatively unknown in other 

 species of culture ; and although the operators, from being 

 disseminated over so great an extent of territory, are conse- 

 quently more widely separated from each other, still the exist- 

 ence of a connecting link, by friendly co-operation in one 

 common cause, may justly and appropriately assimilate their 

 united exertions to that joyous period in the history of France, 

 when during the reign of Probus, thousands of all ages and 

 sexes united in one spontaneous and enthusiastic effort for the 

 restoration of their vineyards. Nor indeed when the far 

 greater limits of our territory are considered, can the com- 

 bined efforts of our fellow-countrymen fail to produce effects 

 even more important, from the greater extent of their influence. 



The opinions of some political writers, that we should con- 

 tinue to import adulterated wines and spirits of all kinds, in 

 order to afford the government the means of thence deriving a 

 revenue of a per centage on their value, even at the sacrifice of 

 the morals of the nation, and the diminution of its wealth, by 

 a course seemingly less objectionable, because less direct ; but 

 which is not less fatal in exhausting our resources ; seem fast 

 merging to that oblivion, where the desire and the pride of a 

 truly national independence should consign them ; and we may 

 hope that the day is not far distant, when America will fully 

 establish and claim a rivalry with the most favoured lands of 

 the vine and the olive, and proudly disclaim being tributary 

 to any foreign clime. 



