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IN

EUROPEAN VINEYARDS:

TREATING OF

VINE-CULTURE; VINE DISEASE AND ITS CURE;

WINE - MAKING AND WINES, RED AND WHITE;
WINE-DRINKING, AS AFFECTING

HEALTH AND MORALS.

BY WILLIAM J. FLAGG.

NEW YORK:

HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS,

FRANKLIN SQUARE.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by

HARPER & BROTHERS,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

PREFACE.

I THINK my work will be found in some degree.

interesting to the general reader, if he have curiosity, which Hume defines as "the love of learning."

I think, too, it may prove instructive to the general drinker as well, inasmuch as it relates to his daily beverages, and their effects on his health and happi

ness.

But my chief aim has been to convey information, both practical and theoretical, bearing on the important matter of wine-growing in America. Inasmuch as such information has of necessity got interwoven and somewhat entangled throughout the whole texture of the narrative, and might consequently be difficult to refer to, I have added an index, which will help the reader to search out what he may need to find, under the several heads of "planting," "training," "pruning," etc.

To the same end, I would here indicate, in advance, a few of the more important matters which

will be found mentioned here and there, and not always just where they ought.

These are:

1. Long pruning, which, as commonly practiced in America, I deem to have been an efficient cause for the decay of our vines.

2. Drainage, the want of which, especially in the Ohio Valley, I feel quite certain has been equally injurious.

3. The advantage of growing wine on plains rather than on hills, except where the quality obtained from hill-grown vines is such as will compensate for their larger cost and smaller yield.

4. Training in low souche, and without stakes, as probably better adapted to our warm summers than the expensive methods imitated from countries where peaches can only be ripened on trees flattened and fastened to the south sides of high walls.

5. Red wine, as preferable to white, for the future beverage of Americans.

6. The sulphur-cure, as entirely efficacious against the disease of the vine in all its many forms, if only well applied.

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