die with a knife and spread over hurdles in the sun. The fruit being 

 dried internally, the side of the skin is turned up. When well dried 

 the villagers perform the operation of putting the fruit a pania, as they 

 commonly call it there. The pania is composed of the sixth part of 

 canes cut to a point, all the figs being fixed two by two, between two of 

 these canes; thus they form quadrangular plates about twenty inches 

 in length, and of the width of a fig that has been opened and spread 

 out; that is to say, about four inches. These panie are exposed for a 

 few days to the sun so as to dry them still better. The harvest and 

 desiccation being wholly completed, the farmers wash all the panie with 

 fresh water and set them out in the sun for another day. All this being 

 done, the figs are preserved for the winter in chests or pantries, or else 

 they are sold to speculators." 



Information still more precise than the preceding is given for the 

 province of Catania by the Agricultural Association, which, in answer 

 to queries from the Ministry on this subject, thus expresses itself: 



" The cultivation of figs is rather extended in the district of Catania, 

 and especially in all the allodii (freeholds) of the Etna region, where 

 the fig is spontaneous. Many are the varieties of figs, both early and 

 late, or backward, grown in this district, and the markets are supplied 

 with fresh figs from the end of July to the end of December. 



"The first white figs are called Auttati, better named Agostani, and 

 the black, Fichi melongiane; the last are black and small, and are called 

 Nataline, or Natalinedde, because they ripen about Christmas time. 



"The fresh figs are consumed where they are produced, being as 

 healthy a food as grapes and the opuntia (Indian fig or prickly pear). 

 Part of the fresh fruit, however, is exported outside the province, par- 

 ticularly to some places in the provinces of Syracuse and Caltamissetta. 

 Both the white and the black figs which ripen in the months of October 

 and November are dried. 



" The desiccation is done in two ways. If the fig be small, then it is 

 dried whole with the peduncle; but if large, it is opened in two with a 

 knife, and thus reduced it is exposed to the solar rays over hurdles, the 

 fleshy part up. In the first case, the figs are said to be dried a passuluni; 

 in the second, a chiappa. 



"As soon as the figs are deprived of that honeyed juice which renders 

 them rather soft, they are subjected to the following treatment: The 

 passuluni are strung on thin rushes, or on twigs of ligara, called, also, 

 liami, or else on slivers of cane, which are disposed in squares, that is, 

 the slivers are fixed to two strips of ferula. The figs a chiappa are 

 formed by the reunion of two figs, placed one above the other on the 

 fleshy side, leaving outwardly the side of the skin. In this manner the 

 two halves of the chiappa are pierced through the center by ligara or 

 rushes, as above, and the chiappa are then superposed one over the other. 

 The passuluni and the chiappa, having been united, water is set to boil; 

 and while boiling, the figs thus prepared are immersed into it for a few 

 minutes, in order to prevent any fermentation that might take place, 

 and then they are put out anew in the sun to be dried again. This 

 done, the passuluni squares are put away in dry places; those that are 

 strung are rolled together spirally, and the same is practiced for the figs 

 a chiappa, thus giving wheels of passuluni figs and of figs a chiappa, 

 which are named scerti di ficu, and are preserved as the best. 



" In some places the white figs are distinguished from the black, and 



2-F 



