COMMON FIG-TREE. ] ' ", 
a mass of soil, to protect them from the effects of the frost. It is observed in the 
" NouveauCours d' Agriculture," that the figs of Argenteuil, are never brought to 
such a degree of perfection as to please the palates of those who have been accus- 
tomed to the figs of Marseilles. They are, according to 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 insertion 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. . 
In British and American nurseries, the fig is generally propagated by layers; 
though these do not ripen their wood the first season, so well as cuttings. When 
the fig is to be planted as a standard tree, constant attention musl be paid to 
remove all the suckers from the collar, and all side shoots from the stem. When 
trained against a wall in a cold climate, the branches should proceed from a 
single stem, and not from the collar, as is generally the case; because the plant, 
when so treated, produces shoots which are less vigorous, and, consequently, 
more likely to ripen their wood. 
The process of caprification, which has been in use from time immemorial, in 
the Levant, is described by Theophrastus, Plutarch, Pliny, and other authors of 
antiquity, and more recently by Tournefort; and though it is laughed at by 
many of the French physiologists of the present day, it is thought by many that 
it must be of some important use. We think it too curious a circumstance, how- 
ever, in a notice of this species, to be omitted, as it furnishes a convincing proof 
of the reality of the sexes of plants. The operation consists in inducing a certain 
species of insect of the gnat kind, (Cynips,) which abounds on the wild 
(Caprificus,) to enter the fruit of the cultivated varieties, for the purpose of punc- 
turing its pericarp, in order to deposite its eggs, and thereby hasten its maturity. 
By this means, the fertile flowers in the interior of the fruit become fecundated 
by the farina of the barren ones near the orifice; but. without this operation, 
though the fruit may ripen, but few effective seeds are produced. It is alleg< I 
by Bosc, that there is no other object in this practice than that ot 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 Idling it with 
mature seeds, to render it more nourishing; as appears to be the case with the 
Osage orange. Olivier, the botanical traveller, asserts, that, alter a long res- 
idence in the islands of the Archipelago, he is convinced ot the inutility ol the 
practice; and Bosc, though he allows that it may hasten the maturity ol the li- 
as the larva of the Pyralis pomona accelerates the maturity ot the apple, in 1 ranee, 
yet, he believes that it has no effect in improving either the size or the flavour ol 
the fruit. M. Bernard, the author of a - Memoire sur le E igmer' andol tin- arti- 
cle of that tree in the < Nouveau Du Hamel,' 
figs, 
size, 
When the fruit has acquired a third par. ol us size, a slice is cul off he end of 
it, of a sufficient depth to remove all the stamens, which have ool bj this 
matured the fertilizing dust. The wound is immediately covered with sap, 
which thickens, and forms a mass tlm excludes the air Hon, he interior ol .th 
fruit; and the consequence is, thai n ripens or becomes ready o dropoff ; in hall 
the time usually taken by nature, without losing any ol its Size 01 ol its Bavo 
