that equal or excel the parent. Florists con- 

 sider themselves as fortunate if, among a 

 thousand Hyacinths or Tulips, they obtain 

 three or four deserving of notice. 



The young Olives begin to yield fruit the 

 tenth or twelfth year, and are fully produc- 

 tive about the twenty-fifth or thirtieth : thus 

 Hesiod's observation, that no man gathers 

 fruit from an Olive of his own planting , 

 must be admitted with the abatements of 

 poetry. 



A second method of forming a nursery, 

 which has been successfully adopted near 

 Toulon, is by transplanting the young wild 

 Olives. 



The ancients relied principally upon pro- 

 pagation by slips, 1 and this easy and expe- 

 ditious mode is still generally followed in 

 Spain. A smooth, thriving sprout or branch, 

 one or two inches in diameter, is cut into 

 pieces twelve or fifteen inches long, which 

 are carefully set, without wounding the bark, 

 in ground prepared as for the seed. They are 

 placed at the~ distance of three feet, and at 



1 See Geopon. , lib. ix , cap. v. 



