Chap. 48.] 
THE TREES OF THE MEDITERRANEAN. 
209 
there should happen to be no rain, it ought to be watered 
when sown : when the plants are about a cubit in height, 
they are replanted in trenches a foot in depth. It is trans- 
planted at the equinoxes, while the shrub is yet tender, and in 
three years it will arrive at maturity. It is cut at the vernal 
equinox, when the flower is just going off ; a child or an old 
woman is able to do this, and their labour may be had at a 
trifling rate. It is of a white appearance, and if one would 
wish to express briefly what it looks like, it is a trifoliated 
shrub, with small, narrow leaves. It is always given to 
animals at intervals of a couple of days, and in winter, when it is 
dry, before being given to them, it is first moistened with water. 
Ten pounds of cytisus will suffice for a horse, and for smaller 
animals in proportion : if I may here mention it by the way, 
it is found very profitable to sow garlic and onions between 
the rows of cytisus. 
This shrub has been found in the Isle of Cythnus, from 
whence it has been transplanted to all the Cyclades, and more 
recently to the cities of Greece, a fact which has greatly in- 
creased the supply of cheese : considering which, I am much 
surprised that it is so rarely used in Italy. This shrub is proof, 
too, against all injuries from heat, from cold, from hail, and 
from snow : and, as Hyginus adds, against the depredations of 
the enemy even, the wood^^ produced being of no value what- 
ever. 
CflAP. 48. (25.) THE TREES AND SHRTIBS OE THE MEDITER- 
RANEAN. THE PHYCOS, PRASON, OR ZOSTER. 
Shrubs and trees grow in the sea^* as well ; those of our 
sea^^ are of inferior size, while, on the other hand, the Eed Sea 
and all the Eastern Ocean are filled with dense forests, ^^^o 
other language has any name for the shrub which is known to 
the Greeks as the *'phycos,"^^ since by the word ''alga''^^ a 
32 a Frutex." When speaking of it as a shrub, he seems to be confound- 
ing the tree with the plant. 
Evidently in allusion to the tree. 
He alludes to various kinds of fucus or sea-weed, which grows to a 
much larger size in the Eastern seas. 
The Mediterranean. 
36 Whence the word fucus" of the naturalists. 
2^ Fee suggests that this may be the Laminaria saccharina of Linnaeus, 
being one of the " ulvse " often thrown up on the coasts of Europe. 
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