194 
plikt's natueal history. 
[Book XIII. 
of the tree of Ethiopia bears a much stronger resemblance to 
wool, and the follicule is much larger, being very similar in 
appearance to a pomegranate ; as for the trees, they are other- 
Avise similar in every respect. Besides this tree, there are 
some palms, of which we have spoken already.*^ In describing 
the islands along the coast of -<Slthiopia, we have already made 
mention*^ of their trees and their odoriferous forests. 
CHAP. 29. (15.) THE TEEES OE MOUNT ATLAS. THE CITRUS, AND 
THE TABLES MADE OF THE WOOD THEREOF. 
Mount Atlas is said to possess a forest of trees of a peculiar 
character, of which we have already spoken.*^ In the vicinity 
of this mountain is Mauretania, a country which abounds in 
the citrus, a tree which gave rise to the mania for fine 
tables, an extravagance with which the women reproach the 
men, when they complain of their vast outlay upon pearls. 
There is preserved to the present day a table which belonged 
to M. Cicero,^^ and for which, notwithstanding his. compara- 
tively moderate means, and what is even more surprising still, 
at that day too, he gave no less than one^ million sesterces : I 
we find mention made also of one belonging to Gallus Asinius, | 
which cost one million one hundred thousand sesterces. Two j 
tables were also sold by auction which had belonged to King ^ 
Juba ; the price fetched by one was one million two hundred I 
thousand sesterces, and that of the other something less, j 
There has been lately destroyed by fire, a table which came ij 
down from the family of the Cethegi, and which had been sold 
for the sum of one million four hundred thousand sesterces, 
the price of a considerable domain, if any one, indeed, could be l 
found who would give so large a sum for an estate. |i 
43 In c. 9 of tke present Book. See B. vi. c. 36, 37. 
*5 Desfontaines observed in the vicinity of Atlas, several trees pecu- 
liar to that district. Among others of this nature, he names the Pistacia 
Atlantica, and the Thuya artieulata. 
46 See B. V. c. 1. 
Generally supposed to be the Thuya artieulata of Desfontaines, the 
Gedrus Atlantica of other botanists. 
This rage for fine tables made of the citrus is alluded to, among others, ; 
by Martial and Petronius Arbiter. See also Lucan, A. ix. B. 426, et. seq, |i 
*9 It is a rather curious fact that it is in Cicero's works that we find j 
the earliest mention made of citrus tables, 2nd Oration ag. Verres, s. 4 
" You deprived Q. Lutatius Diodorus of Lilybaeum of a citrus table of re- 
markable age and beauty." Somewhere about £9000. 
