ASSYRIAN MONUMENTS. 133 



tree with the object of obtaining hybrids ; but with 

 the object of making the female flower set fruit. 

 Nevertheless the practical result was that of modern 

 horticulturists, viz. that of producing hybrids and 

 variations, through the raising of plants from the crossed 

 seed. 



Now, in the Persian Gulf, and in other places, the 

 fine kinds of date trees — and there are hundreds of 

 them — are propagated by offsets, which grow at the 

 foot of the stems, and which will in due course re- 

 produce the same kind of fruit as the parent. The 

 offsets would be, in short, nothing but slips or cuttings 

 of the tree. A great number of the date trees figured 

 on the monuments show these offsets at the foot of 

 the stem ; so that even this seemingly unimportant 

 bit of reality has not been overlooked. Whether the 

 Assyrians in those days had learnt the value of these 

 offsets or not is impossible to ascertain from the monu- 

 ments. Anyhow, propagation by seed must have been 

 known to them from the most remote times. It could 

 not have been otherwise, as the date stones thrown 

 about, near their dwellings, would have germinated in 

 quantities. Birds, squirrels, monkeys, etc., feeding on 

 the dates in the groves and forests would have largely 

 helped to scatter the date seeds, and therefore multi- 

 plication by seed must have been observable every- 

 where. 



