474 FICUS CARICA. 
would seem, from some of the old English writers, and indeed from a common 
expression even of the present day, that, from some association of ideas, the fig 
was an object of contempt. " Flgo for thy friendship," says Pistol, in Henry IV 
Steevens, the commentator on Shakspeare, thinks that the "fig of Spain," men- 
tioned by many of the old British poets, alluded " to the custom of giving poisoned 
figs to those who were the objects of Spanish or Italian revenge;" and hence, 
probably, a vulgar prejudice against this fruit. 
Propagation, Management, fyc. The common fig-tree is easily propagated by 
cuttings of the shoots or roots, (not one of which will fail,) and also by suckers, 
layers, and seeds. In France, more particularly about Marseilles, where the fig 
is extensively grown as an article of commerce, an open situation is made choice 
of, for a plantation, near the sea, and exposed to the south aud east. The ground 
is trenched two or three feet deep, and richly manured; and the trees are planted 
in squares, or in the quincunx-form, at from twelve to fifteen feet apart. The 
plants are watered frequently during the first summer, and left without any prun- 
ing whatever; but in the winter of the second year, they are cut down to the 
ground. The third year, they throw up vigorous shoots, five or six of which are 
retained to form a bush; and in the following, or fourth year, the tree is suffered 
to ripen fruit. In some cases, the trees are trained to single stems; and this is 
also generally the case in Italy and Greece, where the climate is milder, and the 
tree attains a larger size than in France. In the subsequent management, the 
trees require but little pruning, except when they become too much crowded with 
branches. In the south of France, they always suffer more or less, during very 
hot summers, for the want of water, which they require in abundance, on account 
of the excessive transpiration that takes place from their large leaves, and very 
porous, thinly-covered bark. Hence in seasons of very great drought, the 
branches are sometimes completely scorched and killed by the powerful rays of 
the sun. Severe frost has a similar effect on the branches in winter, even at 
Marseilles, as extreme drought has in summer. In all countries, which may 
properly be called fig climates, two crops are produced in a year. The first is 
from the old wood, and corresponds with the crops of England and some parts 
of the United States ; and the second from the wood of the current year, the figs 
produced by which, in the last-named countries, are never ripened except in hot- 
houses. In Greece, Syria, and Egypt, a third crop is sometimes produced. The 
first crop is ripened, in the south of France and in Italy, in May ; and the second 
crop in September. Those which are to be dried, are left on the tree till they are 
dead ripe, which is known by a drop of sweet liquid that 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, they are exposed every morning 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 they are 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 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 the lye being to harden their 
skins. 
In the north of France, except in the gardens of amateurs, where the fig is 
generally trained against walls, as in Britain, and in some parts of the United 
States, 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. The trees are kept as low bushes, and the shoots are seldom allowed to 
acquire 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 
