264 
DATE TREE. 
season, but more particularly during the great heat! 
of summer. 
These trees are either raised from the seed, or by 
shoots which issue from the trunk or from the 
roots. When they are to be produced from seed, 
three or four of the hard nuts are put into a hole* 
in the spring : in about three or four months they 
begin to germinate, and soon afterwards push up a 
single leaf. The second year two or three make 
their appearance 5 and at length, before the third 
year is expired, the plant begins to resemble the 
parent tree, and show a few of the pinnate leaves. 
But this method of raising the date is tedious, as 
the plants seldom bear fruit before they are twelve 
or fifteen years old ; the Arabs, consequently, have 
almost entirely rejected this mode of cultivation, 
and adopted the other. The shoots which they 
select for this purpose, are from the best and most 
flourishing date trees ; and they proceed by plant- 
ing them at a small distance from each other. At 
the end of three or four years, if these shoots have 
been properly managed, they will begin to bear 
fruit ; but in this stage of their growth, the fruit is 
dry, of a less agreeable flavour, and without any 
stones; they are considered, nevertheless, as equally 
nourishing, though they do not arrive at the highest 
degree of perfection till the plant has attained its 
fifteenth or twentieth year. 
The date tree is long in coming to perfection ; 
but then it amply repays the cultivator by its 
