BOOK XVII. xxvi. I22-XXVIII. 124 



difference between the two varieties is this : the 

 former is more proUfic but the latter, the Tereus 

 chestnut, of better quaHty. 



XX\'II. It is mere accident that by its own ingen- propagation 

 uitv has devised the remainin<j kinds of reproduction ; >;yp^nt'»>j 



■ ' I 1 1 ,r I 1 i- 1 branches. 



it taught us to break oti branches irom trees and 

 phmt them because stakes driven into the earth had 

 taken root. This method is used to grow many 

 trees, especially the fig, which can be grown in all 

 the other ways except from a cutting ; the best plan 

 indeed is to take a comparatively large branch and 

 point it at the end hke a stake and drive it deep into 

 the earth, leaving a small head above ground and 

 covering up even this with sand. Pomegranates 

 also are grown from a branch, the passage into the 

 hole having first been widened with stakes ; and so 

 also the myrtle ; in all of these a branch is used that 

 is three feet long and not so thick as a man's arm, 

 and the bark is carefully preserved and the trunk" 

 sharpened to a point at the end. 



XXVIII. The myrtle is grown from cuttings as pianHno 

 well as in other ways, and that is the only way used "^""'"^* 

 for the mulberry, because superstitious fear of Ught- 

 ning forbids its being grafted on an elm. Conse- 

 quently we must now speak about the planting of 

 cuttings. In this care must be taken above all that 

 the cuttings are made from trees that bear weU, 

 that they are not bent in shape nor scabbed or 

 forked, that they are thick enough to fiU the hand 

 and not less than a foot long, that they are planted 

 without injury to the bark and always with the cut 

 end and the part that was nearest the root downward, 

 and during the process of budding the plant is kept 

 heaped over with earth until it attains strength. 



87 



