488 
plti^y's natubal history. [BookXYII. 
oil/^ what are the different varieties of the olive, in what kind 
of soil it ought to be planted, and what is the proper aspect 
for the olive-yard. Mago recommends that the olive should 
be planted on declivities and in dry spots, in an argillaceous 
soil, and between autumn and the winter equinox. If, on the 
other hand, the soil is thick, humid, or somewhat damp even, 
it ought to be planted between harvest and the winter solstice ; 
advice, however, it should be remembered, applicable to Africa 
more particularly. At the present day, it is mostly the custom 
in Italy to plant the olive in spring, but if it is thought de- 
sirable to do so in the autumn as well, there are only four days 
in the forty between the equinox and the setting of the Yer- 
gilise that are unfavourable for planting it.*^ It is a practice 
peculiar to Africa, to engraft the olive on the wild olive only, 
a tree which is made to be everlasting, as it were ; for when it 
becomes old the best of the suckers are carefully trained for 
adoption by grafting, and in this way in another tree it 
grows young again ; an operation which may be repeated con- 
tinuously as often as needed ; so much so, indeed, that the 
same olive-yard will last for ages.*^ The wild olive also is 
propagated both by insertion and inoculation. 
It is not advisable to plant the olive in a site where the 
qiiercus has been lately rooted up ; for the earth-worms, known 
as ^^raucse," which breed in the root of the quercus, are apt 
to get into that of the olive. It has been found, from practical 
experience, that it is not advisable to bury the cuttings in the 
ground nor yet to dry them before they are planted out. Ex- 
perience has also taught us that it is the best plan to clean an 
old olive-yard every other year, between the vernal equinox 
and the rising of the Yergiliae, and to lay moss about the roots ; 
to dig holes also round the trees every year, just after the 
summer solstice, two cubits wide by a foot in depth, and to 
manure them every third year. 
Mago, too, recommends that the almond should be planted 
between the setting of Arc turns and the winter solstice. All 
4^ B. XV. c. 6. 
^5 See c. 2 of this Book, and B. xviii. c. 69. 
The oUve is an extremely long-lived tree ; it has been known to live 
OS long as nine or ten centuries. A fragment of the bark, with a little 
wood attached, if put in the ground, will throw out roots and spring up. 
Hence it is not to be wondered at, that the ancients looked upon it as im- 
mortal. B. xviii. c. 74. 
