No. 244.] 385 



Mons. Porcher's Treatise on the Fuchsia. He has clone for that 

 beautiful flower, what Mons. Berlese has done for the Camellia. 



THE NATIVE GRAPE. 



Mr. Alanson Nash presented and read the following paper on this 

 subject, relative to the vines of the Connecticut valley and of the 

 South: 



Many parts of our country abound with the native or indigenous 

 grapes, which when cultivated, are superior to the foreign varieties. 



The native grape seems better adapted to the American climate, 

 and physical state and condition of the soil and atmosphere, than the 

 €Xotic or foreign species. 



Our native vines are more hardy and prolific, the culture being 

 equal, than any that I have ever seen of the foreign stock. 



We might as soon expect to witness the sugar maple, from the 

 Green Mountains, thrive on the sunny plains of Sicily, as to see 

 grape vines from that island flourish when transplanted to the severe 

 and snowy climate of New England, 



Obey the law of nature, is a command no less enjoined upon us 

 in the physical than in the moral world. 



Almost every latitude and longitude of our globe has a system of 

 vegetable economy more or less peculiar to itself, and it is a vain 

 or idle undertaking to bring plants, trees or vines, from a foreign 

 climate and set them down by the side of the native growth, and 

 expect to see them thrive equal to those indigenous to our American 

 soil. 



We are certainly in an error when we bring grape vines from oth- 

 er countries and cultivate them here to the neglect of our own na- 

 tive grapes, which so abundantly are found in our forests. Far less 

 culture of the native vines would produce a better or equal yield of 

 fruit than can be obtained from the exotics. 



Besides many cases come yearly to our knowledge, of a total fail- 

 ure ot fruit from vines which have been transported from foreign 

 soils to our own. 



[Assembly, No. 244. J Z 



