98 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



will not ripen either, and it is upon well-ripened wood that a 

 crop of Grapes (or any other kind of fruit) mainly depends. 



The vineyard was a failure in 1880 from the cause I have 

 indicated. There was a very good crop in 1881, which made 

 excellent wine. The whole of the vintage, with the exception of 

 a few dozens kept for the use of the Castle, was sold at 60s. per 

 dozen to a wine merchant at Cardiff. Dr. Lawson Tait, late of 

 Birmingham — a noted connoisseur in wines — bought several 

 dozens of it from the wine merchant in question, some of which 

 was sold by auction at Birmingham last year and realised 1156. 

 per dozen. I remember a few years ago sending a couple of 

 bottles of this vintage for the Council of the Koyal Horticultural 

 Society to taste. I did so at the request of the Rev. H. H. 

 D'ombrain. They were well pleased with the wine, and pro- 

 nounced it to resemble a first-class still champagne. 



The summers of 1882 and 1883 were both bad, and no wine 

 was made ; the vines also on the Castle wall at Cardiff failed to 

 ripen any fruit during these years. In 1884 the summer was 

 better, and we made four hogsheads of wine, and the same quan- 

 tity in 1885, but the crop in 1886 was a complete failure. The 

 vines, however, ripened their canes well, and in 1887 (Jubilee 

 year) the crop was good. The summer was warm and dry 

 throughout, there was no lack of sunshine, and the rainfall for 

 the year was only 29*82 inches, which fell on 160 days. The 

 Grapes ripened thoroughly, and the yield of the vintage was 

 ten hogsheads of good wine. 



Perhaps this is the best place to mention that Lord Bute was 

 so pleased with the results of the experiment at Castle Coch 

 that he instructed me in 1886 to make further experiments with 

 the cultivation of the vine in different parts of his Welsh estates, 

 where there was a probability of its succeeding. After inspect- 

 ing several places, I selected an eleven-acre field seven miles from 

 Cardiff, close to the shore of the Bristol Channel, as being a 

 most likely place for a vineyard to succeed. Both the character 

 of the soil and the situation are very similar to those of the 

 Castle Coch vineyard ; the soil is, however, shallower, being in 

 some places not more than eight inches from the mountain lime- 

 stone rock on the breast and higher portions of the field. For 

 protection against cattle it was enclosed all round with a barbed 

 wire fence four feet high, and, to prevent rabbits from getting 



