PROPAGATION. 289 



wants ? Can we produce a hybrid that will not 

 possess this constitutional failing? We think 

 not. It must appear, more or less, in the whole 

 race produced in this way. If we get enough 

 of the goodness of the foreign grape to make it- 

 self apparent in the seedling, we shall just as * 

 certainly get enough of the evil to make the 

 goodness of little or no use to us. The charac- 

 teristics of one parent or the other will, as a rule, 

 predominate in any hybrids that may be raised 

 in this way, though we are not unmindful that 

 crosses, where both parents possess the requisite 

 hardiness, may, in time, be. produced that shall 

 unite the most desirable qualities of both ; but, 

 aside from the remoteness of the possibility, it 

 may well be doubted whether such crosses will, 

 after all, be so well suited to our climate as to 

 possess any great value for general cultivation. 

 But we may be pointed to Eogers's Hybrids as 

 militating against this view of the subject. We 

 think they fail to reach it ; or, if it be admitted 

 that they do, they are only examples of the na- 

 tive parent predominating in a very remarkable 

 manner, and thus support our view. But there 

 are good grounds for questioning the hybrid 

 character of these grapes. A very critical exam- 

 ination of the wood, leaves, and fruit, fails to 



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