CHAP. C. URTICA‘CEA. FI‘CUS. 1369 
dead ripe, which is known by a drop of sweet liquid which appears hanging 
from the eye. The figs, being gathered, are placed on wicker hurdles, in a dry 
airy shed ; and, when the dew is off, every morning they are exposed to the sun 
during the hottest part of the day. To facilitate the progress of drying, the 
figs are occasionally flattened with the hand ; and, in moist dull weather, they 
are placed in rooms warmed by stoves. When thoroughly dried, they are 
packed in rush baskets, or in boxes, in layers, alternately with long straw and 
laurel leaves, and in this state they are sold to the merchants. In some parts 
of the south of France, figs are prepared by dipping them in hot lye made from 
' the ashes of the fig tree, and then dried ; the use of lye being to harden their 
skins. The white figs are preferred for the market, the violet kind being 
retained in the country for the use of the inhabitants ; and forming in Greece, 
with barley bread, their principal food for a great part of the year. Fowls 
are remarkably fond of figs ; and, where they are abundant, as in the depart- 
ment of the Var in France, and in the islands of the Archipelago, they are 
given to horses, mules, and oxen, with a view to strengthen and bring them 
into good condition, or to fatten them. 
Culture and Management of the Fig in the North of France. Except in the 
gardens of private persons, where the fig is generally trained against walls, as 
in England, there are only two or three places where it is grown for its fruit 
as a standard ; and the principal of these is at Argenteuil,in the neighbourhood 
of Paris. We visited the fig gardens there in 1828; and an account of them, 
at length, will be found in the Gardener’s Magazine, vol. vii. p. 262. The fig 
trees are kept as low bushes, and the shoots are never allowed to attain more 
than three or four years’ growth; because it is necessary to bend them down to 
the ground, and retain them there, by means of stakes, or stones, or a mass of 
soil, to protect them from the drying effects of the frost. It is observed in the 
Nouveau Cours d’ Agriculture, that the figs at Argenteuil are never brought to 
such a degree of perfection as to please the palates of those who have been 
accustomed to the figs of Marseilles. They are, says the writer, always either 
insipid or half rotten; and, even to bring them to this state, it is necessary 
to pinch off the points of the shoots, in the same way as is done with the vine 
when early grapes are wanted ; or with the pea, to accelerate the maturity of 
the pods. An additional process is requisite in cold seasons, and at the latter 
end of every season ; and that is, the inserting of a small drop of oil, by means 
of a straw, into the eye of the fruit; which has the effect of destroying the 
vital principle, and causing the fig to part readily from the shoot, like ripe 
fruit ; after which it soon begins to decay. 
Caprification. This process, which we shall hereafter describe, and which 
has been in use for an unknown length of time in the Levant, was first men- 
tioned by Tournefort ; and, though it is laughed at by many of the French phy- 
siologists of the present day, we cannot help thinking that it must be of some 
important use. It is alleged by Bosc that it has no other object than that of 
hastening the maturity of the crop; but others are of opinion that, by insuring 
the fecundation of the stigma, it tends to increase the size of the fruit, and, by fill- 
ing it with mature seeds, to render it more nourishing. Olivier, the botanical 
traveller, asserts that, after a long residence in the islands of the Archipelago, he 
is convinced of the inutility of the practice; and Bosc, though he allows that it 
may hasten the maturity of the figs, as the larva of the pyrale pommonelle hastens 
the maturity of the apple in France, yet believes that it has no effect in improving 
either the size or the flavour of the fruit. M. Bernard, the author of a 
Meémvire sur le Figuier,and of the article on that tree in the Nouveau Du 
Hamel, goes farther, and asserts that the figs which have undergone the process 
of caprification are inferior to others in size, flavour, and the property of keep- 
ing. In Egypt, where the sycamore fig is the prevailing species, an operation 
is performed on the fruit, which is said to answer the purpose of caprification, 
as far as respects early ripening. When the fruit is a third part of its size, a 
slice is cut off the end of it, of a sufficient depth to remove all the stamens, 
which have not by this time matured their fertilising dust. The wound is 
