BL QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Juny, 1899. 
mainly by the dried fruits—the’ raisins of California ripened in the previous 
summer, dried plums from Bosnia, or dried figs from Tonia, with only the orange 
and expensive hot-house grapes to give juice and lusciousness—the colonists are 
picking the last of the strawberries and apricots for themselves, and making 
ready for sale or export exactly the kinds which those who are compelled to eat 
dried fruit here and in the United States would welcome most eagerly. Early 
grapes, exquisitely flavoured pears, early peaches, fresh figs, plums of a size and 
flavour surpassing any grown in this country except in the hottest summers, are 
ripening on the trees of the “Old Colony.” February at the Cape produces 
the finest kinds of English peaches and nectarines, mainly of the late-ripening 
varieties, which are, as a rule, the very best in flavour, even of those 
choice fruits. The difference is that what can only be grown in 
perfection under glass here, or under exceptionally sunny walls in 
favourable seasons, is there produced in abundance on standard trees. 
This fruit can be in London within a month of being gathered, and 
packed in cold chambers is brought here with the bloom still on the plums, 
which look and taste as fresh as if gathered in the garden. This is at a time 
when the east wind is whistling through the trees, and not a bud has yet 
appeared on our own plum and peach trees. It is in February, also, that the 
Cape grapes come to perfection, and have the best and truest flavour. Of 
these the Colony produces one kind in rude abundance, and does produce a 
few, and might produce a great quantity, of very high quality. Wine-making 
is an ancient industry at the Cape, and the most remarkable thing about the 
Cape Colonist’s wine is that, though it has never been properly managed or 
developed, the growers have always succeeded in producing one wine of high 
quality. This is the Constantia, which has in it the guarantee, which no one 
seems ever quite to have accepted, that the Cape climate can bring to absolute 
perfection the essential vinous constituents of the grape, which no other country 
is quite known to do except the port-wine growing district of Portugal. Roasting 
sun, good soil, and something else, probably a very dry, pure air, do this, and 
there always has been a district of the Old Colony where these natural qualities 
of soil and climate were so far appreciated as to make vineyard planting a staple 
industry. But it is one thing to grow grapes for wine, and another to 
grow them for the table. At the present moment there are tons of little black 
vineyard grapes arriving from the Cape. Their condition and taste are an object- 
lesson both as to what the Cape can do and what it might do. These are of 
first-rate flavour, but of all sizes, unthinned, crowded on the clusters, with many 
half-ripe inside the bunches. They are, however, pleasant to taste, and remind 
the buyer of the days of yintage abroad. Their flavour is also evidence of how 
excellent they might be, if properly pruned and thinned. Later, in April, very 
fine white, or rather green, grapes, grown well and carefully packed, come from 
the Cape. They are of medium size, of a beautiful clear green like chryso- 
prase. The flayour is not that of Muscat, but is excellent of its kind. 
For early winter fruit the Cape also contributes varieties which are most 
welcome at that season. Figs ripen in November, and there is practically an 
unlimited market for fresh figs in London. The Cape colonists are anxious to 
develop a business in dried figs, so that they may rival Smyrna. The Karoo is 
looked upon as the future centre of fig-erowing and drying. It is intended to 
introduce the fig-inseet which assists in bringing the Smyrna figs to perfection. 
But we think that before this industry is developed the trade in fresh figs will 
be so large as to repay the growers. The price in this country, even in the 
natural season, is so high that there would be an immense margin for profit if 
they were offered here in December. In early winter Cape strawberries and 
apricots are, in season together, the former being in perfection in November, 
while-the latter last all through December. It is maintained that these Cape 
upricots are, without exception, the best in the world. We have tried them both 
fresh, as delivered here, and preserved, and this experieice, limited necessarily 
to a few cases, entirely bears out the claim made for the fruit. It is incom- 
parable. Loquats in October and Cape gooseberries, a wild variety, which in 
