FIG. 153 



as Tusser, who has furnished us with a list of the fruits 

 which were grown in England in the succeeding reign, 

 has not mentioned the fig-tree ; and Lord Chancellor 

 Bacon, who wrote still later, never mentions it as being 

 cultivated in England, though, from the exalted situation 

 he filled, and the circles in which he moved, he must have 

 had great opportunities of knowing the earliest introduc- 

 tion of trees and plants, which occupied a part of his 

 attention. The almond, which was not introduced until 

 the days of Elizabeth, is particularly mentioned by him 

 as one of our fruits ; but the fig is not in his list. He 

 says, " there be divers fruit-trees in the hot countries, 

 which have blossoms, and young fruit, and ripe fruit, 

 almost all the year, succeeding one another." And it is 

 said, the orange has the like with us. for a great part of 

 summer; and so also has the fig." 



The Hortus Kewensis informs us, that the fig-tree was 

 planted in this country in 1548. Gerard says, in 1597, 

 that " the fruit of the fig-tree never cometh to maturity 

 with us, except the tree be planted under a hot wall." 

 'arkinson also, in 1629, says, that " if you plant it not 

 against a brick wall, it will not ripen so kindly ;" but 

 much must depend on the situation of the country. The 

 same author says in his Theatrum Botanicum, 1640, " the 

 blew figge is no doubt of the same operation with the 

 white to all purposes, but the fruite commeth most to ma- 

 turity with us, and is eaten with great pleasure with salt 

 and pepper." 



There is an orchard of fig-trees at Tarring, near Wor- 

 thing, in Sussex, where the fruit grows on standard trees, 

 and ripens as well as in any part of Spain ; these trees 

 are so regularly productive, as to form the principal sup- 

 port of a large family. Although the- orchard does not 

 exceed three-quarters of an acre, there are upwards of one 

 hundred trees, that are about the size of large apple-trees, 



