ON THE CAPKinCATION OF THE FIG. 191 



Spain, France, and Upper Italy. Other figs, called semi-mules, 

 have flowers susceptible of fecundation, the ovaries being fur- 

 nished with ovules. In these fecundation generates the embryo, 

 which causes the nutritive humours to flow to it from the pe- 

 duncles, which can only draw them from the receptacle; this, 

 again, cannot obtain the nutriment from anywhere but from the 

 stem, and thus the fecundation occasions the setting and ripening 

 of the fruit. And as it is only the caprifig that can produce 

 this effect, so caprification is necessary for the perfection of 

 these semi-mule figs. Such are, he says, the figs of the Archi- 

 pelago, and many of those of the kingdom of Naples, all producing 

 female flowers only, 



§ 4. Opinions against Caprification. — There are many who 

 will not admit that any effect is produced by caprification, and 

 these are chiefly ignorant or simple cultivators, who judge from 

 observing that in many places figs ripen without the co-operation 

 of the caprifig. But with these must not be confounded two 

 distinguished French naturalists, Olivier and Bory de St. Vin- 

 cent, who have enounced the same opinion. The former, after 

 having explained the process as practised in Greece, adds : — 

 " This operation, of which some authors, both ancient and 

 modern, have spoken with admiration, appears to me to be 

 nothing more than a tribute of ignorance, which man pays to 

 prejudice. Caprification is unknown in many parts of the 

 Levant, in Italy, in France, and in Spain, and begins to be 

 abandoned in some islands of the Archipelago where it used to 

 be practised, and which nevertheless still produce figs excellent 

 for eating. If the operation were necessary, whether fecundation 

 be effected by the fertilising pollen dispersed in the air, intro- 

 ducing itself into the mouth of the fig, or whether nature make 

 use of a little fly to transmit it from one fig to another, as is 

 commonly believed, it is evident that the first figs in flower 

 could not fecundate at the same time those which have already 

 attained a certain size, and those which are only just appearing, 

 in order to ripen two months later." I do not transcribe the 

 words of Bory, for his narration appears to me to be but a 

 judicious illustration of what Olivier had stated. 



And here I close the history with the following brief recapi- 

 tulation of the different opinions of authors on the mode of 

 operating of caprification. The ancients believed that its virtue 

 depended on the fly of the caprifig, which, by forcing its way 

 into the domestic fig, facilitated the entrance of light and some 

 fertilising or fermenting vapour, and enabled the fig to set and 

 ripen ; and that a poor soil and northern exposure produced the 

 same effect. Tournefort believed that the insect made tlie figs 

 set and ripen by pricking and biting them, giving an issue to the 



