THE ECONOMIC PLANTS OF JAPAN— III. 



137 



rewarded with thirty clusters of reddish-purple, sweet 

 grapes from the plant he had found. The variety was 

 unknown both to himself and to 

 his neighbors. It was [of most 

 excellent quality, and they decided 

 that it should be propagated and 

 cultivated with care. 



' ' In the year 1 197 he had propa- 

 gated it so that he had thirteen 

 plants in bearing, and he then 

 presented to the governor gen- 

 eral, Yoritomo, who 

 became the first she- ^M-' 

 gun, a hundred clus- /^-^P 

 ters of these grapes, 

 which greatly pleas- | 

 e d the recipient. 

 The Shiro-no-hira j' 

 Plain, where the ^ , i 



grape had been found, 

 was hereafter called « 

 Tonaye-shiro (mean- ' - ' 



ing a bed for raising 

 young vines). It ap- 

 pears that the descendants 

 of Kageyu Amamiya con- 

 tinued to cultivate the grape 

 which their father had found, 

 and one of them, Orioenosho 

 Amamiya by name, fre- 

 quently presented grapes to 

 the then famous general, S. 

 Takeda, who was governor 

 of the district, and on one \^»is. 

 occasion he in turn presented 

 his own sword to the vine- 

 yardist, with a note thanking 

 him for the gift, dated the 

 3d of October, 1549. (This \ 

 note and sword are still preserved 

 by the descendants of the family.) 



" In 1601, lyeyasuTokugawa, the 

 first shogun of the house of Tokug- 

 awa, caused an investigation to be 

 made in regard to the cultivation 

 of grapes in Koshiu, knd there was 

 then found to be one hundred and 

 sixty-four vines in bearing of this 

 variety. It now spread to other 

 places also, and in 17 16, when this sub- 

 ject was again investigated by the gov- 

 ernment, there were one hundred and 

 fifty-four tan planted to grapes in the 

 village of Iwaye, and fifty tan in the vil- 

 lage of Katsunuma, a total equaling about 

 fifty-one acres. " (One tan is nearly one- 

 fourth acre.) The latter portion of this 

 story, in regard to the government inves- 

 tigations and also the presents of grapes 



to General Takeda, and his acknowledgment thereof by 

 giving his sword and a letter in return, are matters of 

 history and record and cannot well 

 be doubted. Nor, indeed, can it 

 be doubted that the family of 

 Amamiya were among the first to 

 cultivate this variety. The only 

 vulnerable portion of the story is 

 that which relates to its miracu- 

 lous appearance, 



4" 



which will in all likeli- 

 hood remain a myth 

 forever. 



Fig. I. Red Koshiu Grape. 

 Two-thirds Actual Size. 



CULTURE. 



The grape vines in 

 =. . Japan are invariably 

 trained on a horizon- 

 's tal trellis, varying in 



f height from five to six 

 feet from the ground, 

 and built of bamboo 

 poles in the same 

 I manner as the pear 

 (' trellises described in 

 the January number 

 of The American Garden. On 

 top of this the vines are spread 

 ' in all directions, the branches 



being tied to the trellis. The 

 vines are always pruned with 

 care and much skill. The sys- 

 •' tem is very successful, and it 

 might be worth while to give it 

 an extended trial in American vine- 

 yards. It is said to have been in- 

 vented in 1615, by a physician 

 named Tokumoto Kaye. 



The vines are planted about 

 twelve feet apart each way. The 

 ground between them is not planted 

 with anything else, but the vines are 

 frequently manured with such material 

 as the growers can obtain. Their 

 chief manure is night soil, but when 

 this cannot be obtained in the desired 

 quantity, they also use rice bran, leaves 

 and other organic material of every 

 description which can be collected, 

 "he manuring takes place three or four times 

 during the summer ; the first time early in 

 spring when the vines start to grow, the sec- 

 ond time soon after blooming, and the third 

 time when the berries are about half grown, 

 and sometimes still once more if the manure 

 can be had. The ground is loosened around 

 the vines and a small circle opened with a 

 hoe, into which the manure is poured and the 

 earth again replaced. The vines thrive well 



