HISTORY, IMPROVEMENT, AND NOMENCLATURE. 19 



Figs, many; black and white, large and small; 



Almonds, sweet and bitter ; 



Medlars, larger and smaller ; 



Mulberries, two black varieties ; 



Nuts, hazel and filberts ; 



Strawberries, and Apricots. 



The orange is supposed to have been introduced at Rome 

 at a later period. 



The art of Grafting, so indispensible to the diffusion oi 

 the finer fruits, was well known to the ancients, but its ori- 

 gin is hid in the obscurity of antiquity. It does not appear 

 to have been known in the age of Homer, and is thought to 

 have been first practiced not far from the time of Hesiod. It 

 was familiar to the ancient Greeks of a later period ; and the 

 Roman writers describe a great variety of modes, quite 

 as ingenious as the fanciful variations now used by gar- 

 deners. 



The statements of ancient writers, when not confined to 

 simple historical record, partook largely of the conjectural, 

 and frequently of the marvellous. Hence we find Pliny as- 

 serting that when plums were grafted upon apple stocks, 

 they produced what were called apple-plums ; and upon 

 almond stocks, they yielded a fruit of a compound nature, 

 the stone being like that of the almond. And Virgil, with 

 a little more poetical freedom, speaks of grafting apples on 

 planes ; of adorning the wild ash with the blossoms of the 

 pear ; and represents swine as crunching acorns under elms. 



After the fall of the Empire, the reign of violence nearly 

 extinguished the taste for the improvements of gardening, 

 and destroyed the means of enjoying rural life. Nearly the 

 only exceptions were furnished by the monks, who labored 

 with their own hands in the cultivation of the soil. 



At the close of the eighth century, Charlemagne recom- 

 mended the culture of apples, pears, and plums, and gave 

 great encouragement to the establishment of orchards and 

 vineyards. His friendly intercourse with the Saracenic 

 prince, Haroun al Raschid, enabled him to procure and in- 

 troduce into France, the best sorts of melons, figs, peaches, 

 and other fruits, in existence at that time. 



When Europe gradually emerged from the night of the 

 dark ages, the increased light diffused by the spread of lite- 



