THE PEACHES OF NEW YORK 27 



fruit was not then growing in Greece; for classicists, then as now, seldom 

 got down to earth and the things growing in it. 



The peach in Italy. — Naturally one goes to the oldest book in Latin 

 literature on agriculture to look for the beginnings of peach-culture in 

 Italy. This, as every student knows, is De Re Rustica, a work on farming, 

 gardening and fruit-growing by Cato (235-150 b. c.) on whom posterity 

 has bestowed the appellation " Sturdiest Roman of Them All." Cato 

 mentions most of our common orchard-fruits, as well as our field crops and 

 garden-plants, but the peach is not in his list of fruits; neither does Varro 

 (117-27 B. c), the next great Roman writer on agriculture, seem to have 

 known the peach though he mentions choice varieties of cultivated cherries, 

 which at his time had but newly been introduced into Rome. 



To Vergil (71-19 b. c), we are indebted for the first reference to the 

 peach in Roman literature. The " Prince of Latin Poets," writing on 

 agriculture, orcharding and gardening, in the Georgics, mentions the peach 

 in these graceful lines: 



" Myself will search our planted grounds at home. 

 For downy peaches and the glossy plum." 

 Columella, writing in the next generation after Vergil, about 40 A. d., 

 adopts or starts the story of the peach being a poisonous gift sent from 

 Persia to Egypt : 



" And apples, which most barbarous Persia sent, 

 With native poison arm'd (as fame relates) : 

 But now they've lost their pow'r to kill, and yield 

 Ambrosial juice, and have forgot to hurt ; 

 And of their country still retain the name." 

 Some hold, however, that Columella refers not to the peach, " persica " 

 but to " persa " a quite different fruit. But unquestionably, according 

 to commentators. Columella has the peach in mind in these lines: 

 " Those of small size to ripen make great haste; 

 Such as great Gaul bestows observe due time 

 And season, not too early, nor too late." 

 By these tokens do we know that the peach was cultivated in Italy 

 some years before the Christian era. 



In Pliny's remarkable compend of the natural history lore that existed 

 at the beginning of the Christian era, we have the first information worthy 

 of note on the peach in Italy. His statements, though they throw more 

 light on what the peach then was than the writings of any one until his 

 time, taking a more utilitarian turn than those of the Greeks, are con- 



