NATURE OF FRUIT 



development of the fig is an interesting lesson in 

 plant evolution. At one time, certainly, there were 

 no edible figs, and wild varieties which still grow 

 in great numbers along the Eastern Mediterranean 

 indicate that centuries of intelligent / at breeding 

 produced trees bearing palatable fruit before the 

 recorded history of Europe began. Those trees 

 whose flowers mature in woody knots, or warty 

 shells, instead of edible fruit, are called capri figs. 

 The abstract question whether the fig is a fruit, or 

 not, has been gravely discussed by medieval writers, 

 but that is a matter of scientific differentiation ; as 

 it has palatable pulp and juice which remind us 

 in the eating more of fruits than of nuts, or of any 

 other food, for household and commercial purposes 

 it will continue to be accepted as such. 



It would be interesting to sketch the growth of 

 the area of fig cultivation, but that would be beyond 

 the object of this volume. Our best information is, 

 that the edible varieties were flourishing in Asia 

 Minor at least nine centuries B. C, and from that 

 period on with each martial conquest the invading 

 armies carried them along, and spread one variety 

 after another, until the Mediterranean countries, 

 Portugal, Southern England, Central Asia and 

 Eastern Africa were well stocked; while the atten- 

 tion they received by such historians and natural- 

 ists as Varro, Pliny, Cato and Virgil attest the great 

 importance the ancients attached to them as a staple 

 article of food. We remember reading how Rom- 



