Chap. 20.] ANECDOTES CONNECTED WITH THE EIG. 309 



winter fig and the black Telanian 64 with a long stalk, you 

 must select a richer soil, or else a ground well manured." 

 Since his day there have so many names and kinds come up, 

 that even on taking this subject into consideration, it must be 

 apparent to every one how great are the changes which have 

 taken place in civilized life. 



There are winter figs, too, in some of the provinces, the 

 Moesian, for instance ; but they are made so by artificial means, 

 such not being in reality their nature. Being a small 

 variety of the fig-tree, they cover it up with manure at the end 

 of autumn, by which means the fruit on it is overtaken by 

 winter while still in a green state : then when the weather 

 becomes milder the fruit is uncovered along with the tree, and 

 so restored to light. Just as though it had come into birth 

 afresh, the fruit imbibes the heat of the new sun with the 

 greatest avidity — a different sun, in fact, to that 65 which ori- 

 ginally gave it life — and so ripens along with the blossom of 

 the coming crop ; thus attaining maturity in a year not its 

 own, and this in a country, 66 too, where the greatest cold 

 prevails. 



CHAP, 20. HISTORICAL ANECDOTES CONNECTED WITH THE EIG. 



67 The mention by Cato of the variety which bears the name 

 of the African fig, strongly recalls to my mind a remarkable 

 fact connected with it and the country from which it takes 

 its name. 



Burning with a mortal hatred to Carthage, anxious, too, for the 

 safety of his posterity, and exclaiming at every sitting of the 

 senate that Carthage must be destroyed, Cato one day brought 

 with him into the Senate-house a ripe fig, the produce of that 

 country. Exhibiting it to the assembled senators, " I ask you," 

 said he, " when, do you suppose, this fruit was^plucked from the 

 tree ?" All being of opinion that it had been but lately gathered, 

 — " Know then," was his reply, " that this fig was plucked at 

 Carthage but the day before yesterday 08 — so near is the enemy 



54 The modern " black" tig. 



65 The sun of the former year. 



66 In Moesia — the present Servia and Bulgaria. 



67 Another war is said to have originated in this fruit. Xerxes was 

 tempted by the fine figs of Athens to undertake the invasion of Greece. _ 



« " Tertium ante diem." In dating from an event, the Romans in- 



