The Virginia Gazette

Circumstances of intelligence, proving the excellence of the soil and climate of Virginia, which, to the astonishment of those who came from the best parts of Europe, have been, by many, thought to be bad.

Of 184 plants of oranges, citrons, lemons, &c. put into boxes in Italy, in the month of October, landed in Virginia in June last (when of course they would have but small remains of life) and set in the earth in Albemarle about the latter end of the same month, there are now an hundred and thirty odd which have put out new and luxuriant shoots. Two thirds of the vines which were planted under the same disadvantages have likewise put out new shoots. The olive plants are all living.

The vines planted by Mr. Bolling in the county of Buckingham, although managed according to the directions of the French writers of the 40th and 49th degrees of latitude, are in a condition to yield wine the ensuing year, if well attended to. The slips planted by that Gentleman the last year, after the method of the vignerons of Europe inhabiting a climate similar to our own, have now the appearance of vines 3 or 4 years old. A slip planted by him in the spring of the present year has produced two bunches of grapes; a fact which would not be believed in the wine countries of the old world.

Two kinds of wild grapes have been discovered, of the most promising quality for making good wine when they shall be improved by cultivation, and doubtless more may be discovered.

The olive trees planted in Albemarle, under the Blue Ridge of mountains, about two months before the remarkable frost of the
The colonies of May 1775 are now in a more thriving condition than it is thought they would have been under the like circumstance in any of the old countries of Europe.

This country is certainly calculated to produce, in perfection, every thing of the growth of the temperate zones; and may, by industry, be rendered abundant, happy, and rich, if its inhabitants can be persuaded to get the better of their diffidence of its climate as to things which it will most readily yield.