AN OLIVE GROVE 93 



months. Perhaps not so appealing as the 

 grape-gathering along the Rhine, still 

 the olive harvest makes a picture never to 

 be forgotten. The peasant women 

 (almost always with children helping or 

 playing about) bending busily under the 

 sunlit trees, or working their cautious 

 way down the narrow and rocky paths, 

 the bulging bags of fruit poised precisely 

 upon their erect heads. Pretty touches 

 are unconsciously added to the picture by 

 bits of bright color in the dress, or by 

 those quick Italian movements which are 

 as graceful as long branches swaying in 

 the breeze. 



In good years the fruit is not allowed 

 to drop dead ripe into the grass, but mats 

 and cloths are widely spread beneath the 

 branches, and the trees are lashed with 

 poles which are as pliable as fishing rods. 

 Wandering about in an olive grove, one 

 often hears this lashing, with its continued 

 rattling against the bark, followed by the 

 soft hail of the dropping fruit; and, possi- 



