ENQUIRY INTO PLANTS, III. xi. 3-4 



texture ^ ; the other is shorter, less vigorous in growth, 

 rougher harder and yellower. The leaves in shape 

 are like those of the bay, that is, the broad-leaved 

 bay, but they contract to a sharper jjoint, and they 

 have a sort of jagged outline ^\ith sharp points. 

 The whole leaf (if one may consider this as "^ a ' leaf ' 

 because it is all shed at once) grows on a single 

 stalk ; on either side of a single fibre, as it were, 

 the leaflets grow at a joint in pairs, which are 

 numerous and distinct, just as in the sorb. In some 

 leaves the joints are short ^ and the pairs fewer in 

 number, but in those of the white kind the joint is 

 long and the pairs more numerous, while the leaflets 

 are longer narrower and leek-green in colour. Also 

 this tree has a smooth bark, which is dry thin and 

 red in colour. The roots are matted stout and 

 shallow.* As to the fruit, the people of Ida supposed 

 it to have none, and no flower either ; however it 

 has a nut-like fruit in a thin pod, like the fruit of 

 the almond, and it is somewhat bitter in taste. And 

 it also bears certain other things like winter-buds, 

 as does the bay, but they are more solid,' and each 

 separate one is globular, like those of the plane ; 

 some of these occur around the fruit, some, in fact 

 the greater number,*^ are at a distance from it. The 

 smooth kind ' grows mostly in deep ravines and damp 

 places, the rough kind occurs also in dry- and rocky 

 parts. Some, for inst-ance the Macedonians, call the 



» ^pax«'a conj. Seal, from G ; rpaxta UAld.H. 

 * Bod. inserts ov before fierttepop ; c/. 3. 6. 5. (Idaean 

 account. ) 



' ffTKppoTepa conj. Dalec. ; <rrpu<t>v6r(f)a MSS. 

 « ir\t7<rra conj, R. Const. ; »\e/rro UM VAld- 

 ' c/. Plin., I.e. 



231 



