EUROPEAN OLlVt-TREE. 377 



" A^ain he sent forth the dove out of the ark ; and the dove came 

 hi to him in the evening; and, lo, in lier mouih v/as an ulive leaf pluckt off." 



Genesis viii. 10, 11. 



That the olive was anciently very much esteemed by the Hebrews, is evident 

 from the parable of Jotham, " The trees went forth on a time to appoint a 

 king," fcc. ; and David, also, seems to have considered this tree as a blessing, 

 when he says, "Thy children, like tiie olive branches round about thy table; 

 Lo! thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord." 



The ancient Greeks appear to have thought no less of the olive and of its fruit, 

 than the Israelites ; and the great duration of the tree is apparent from the his- 

 tory of one in the Acropolis at Athens. Ur. Clarke, in his "Travels," in speak- 

 ing of the temple of Pandrosus says, " Within this building, so late as the second 

 century, was preserved the olive-tree mentioned by Apollodorus, which was said 

 to be as old as the foundation of the citadel." A contribution of olives was given 

 by all the Greeks who attended the PanathencBa, a festival held at Athens in 

 honour of Minerva. Those who excelled in any of the games during this festival, 

 were crowned with a wreath of olives, which grew in the grove of Academus, 

 a place near the city, with spacious and shady walks, belonging to a man of that 

 name. 



The ohve, it is said, was first planted in Italy, in the thirteenth year of the 

 reign of Servius TuUius, the Vlth king of Rome ; and during the reign of Tar- 

 quinius Priscus, which was about the one hundred and eighty-third year from the 

 foundation of that city, there were no olive-trees, either in Italy, Spain, or Africa, 

 a strong presumption that they grew originally only in Syria. Theophrastus 

 states that, in the four hundred and fortieth year of the city, there were no 

 olive-trees in Italy, except on the coast, and within forty miles of the sea; but 

 Pliny says, in his time, they were to be found in the very heart of France and 

 Spain, and that the olives of Syria, although smaller, produced the best oil. He 

 also informs us, that in the five hundredth year of the city, when Appius Clau- 

 dius and L. Junius were consuls together, a pound of oil was sold for twelve 

 asses; that in the year 680, ten pounds sold for one ass; and that in twenty-two 

 years after that time, Italy was able to furnish the provinces with oil; and that 

 it was much used by the Romans at their baths, possessing, as they supposed, 

 the property of warming the body, and defending it against the cold. Virgil 

 speaks of but three kinds of olives. Columella mentions ten varieties, and says 

 he believes they were much more numerous. 



As the wood of the olive-tree is very compact and durable, it is not surprising 

 that it should furnish instances of extraordinary longevity. " In comj)arative 

 youth," says a writer in the "North American Review," "the stem increases in 

 diameter only at the rate of an eighth of an inch in a year. Therefore, the olive 

 at Pescio, mentioned by De CandoUe, having a trunk of twenty-four feet in girth, 

 should be seven hundred years old; even supposing it to have grown, through- 

 out, at the ordinary rate for young trees; while the still larger tree at Beaulieu, 

 near Nice, described by Risso, and recently measured by Berthelot, doubtless the 

 oldest of the race in Europe, should be more than a thousand years old. Although 

 now in a state of decrepitude, it still bears an abundant crop of fruit, or at least* 

 did so, as late as the year 1828. It is not improbable, therefore, that those eight 

 venerable trees, which yet survive upon the Mount of Olives, may have been in 

 existence, as tradition asserts, at the time of our Saviour's passion." ]\Ir. Loudon 

 mentions some plantations of olive-trees, in Italy, at Tcrni, which he passed 

 through, in 1819, on his way to the Falls of Marmora, that were supposed to 

 have existed from the time of Pliny. 



Mylliohtfricdl and Lc^cndnnj Allusions. The olive has been the cmbUnn of 

 peace among all nations; perliaj)S. l)ecanse the olive-leaf, brought by the dove to 

 Noah in the ark, was the iirst sign which he received of peace restored between 

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