BOOK XVI. Lxxvi. 197-199 



In trees of this class there is also a difference 

 corresponding to their native countries. The most 

 highly spoken of grow on the Alps and the Apennines, 

 on the Jura and \'osges mountains of Gaul, in Corsica, 

 Bithynia, Pontus and Macedonia. The firs of Aenia 

 and Arcadia are inferior, and those of Parnassus 

 and Euboea the worst, because in those places they 

 are branchy and twisted and the wood is apt to rot. 

 As for the cedar, those in Crete, Africa and Syria 

 are the most highly spoken of. Timber well smeared PtcuHanUes 

 with ccdar oil does not suffer from maggot or decay. 

 The juniper has the same excellence as the cedar; 

 this tree grows to a great size in Spain and especially 

 in the territory of the Vaccaei ; the heart of its 

 timber is everywhere <* even more solid than that 

 of the cedar. A general fault of all timber is what 

 is called cross-grain, when the veins and knots have 

 grown twisted. In some trees are found centres 

 like those in marble, that is hard pieces Uke a nail, 

 unkind to the saw ; and there are some hardnesses 

 due to accident, as when a stone, or the branch of 

 another tree, has been caught in a hollow and 

 taken into the body of the tree. It is said that 

 stones found inside trees serve as a preventive 

 against abortion. In the market-place at Me- 

 gara long stood a wild olive tree on which brave 

 warriors had hung their weapons ; these in the 

 course of time had been hidden by the bark grow- 

 ing round them ; and on this tree depended the 

 fate of the city, an oracle having prophesied that 

 it would be destroyed when a tree gave birth to 

 arms — which happened to this tree when it was 

 cut down, greaves and helmets being found in- 

 side it. 



5T7 



