126 



ON THE VINERYo 



critical season, would be attended with the most 

 fatal consequence. If the weather should become 

 hot and dry, the flowers of many kinds of grapes 

 are liable to fall off : a cold, dark season also will 

 sometimes produce the same bad effect. I may 

 add too, that an extreme degree of fire-heat will 

 prove equally prejudicial. 



The air in the house should not, at any time, 

 during the flowering season, exceed eighty-four or 

 eighty-five degrees of Fahrenheit's thermometer ; 

 and, in a dark cold season, should be kept up to 

 sixty-four or sixty-five degrees. 



The surface of the border should be kept in a 

 moist state, by being constantly sprinkled with 

 water, for grapes set best in a close sultry moist 

 heat. 



As soon as the grapes are grown to the size of 

 small shot, the bunches of the close-growing kinds 

 should be thinned in the manner already described. 



Pinch off the tendrils and laterals whenever they 

 appear ; divest the Vines of all superfluous shoots 

 that may be produced during the summer, that so 

 they may have nothing unnecessary to support. 

 Keep the shoots, as they advance, regularly fas- 

 tened to the trellis and rafters, and never suffer 



ancients, in putting the dried flowers of the Vines into new 

 wine, to give it a pure and flosculous race or spirit, which wine 

 was therefore called 'Oivdv&ivov, allowing unto every Cadus two 

 pounds of dried flowers." 



Sir Thomas Brotvns Miscellaneous Traets, page 25. 



