Mediterranean, and which is inclosed between that sea and the mountains of Cevennes and the Alps.

The

The proper time for gathering olives for the press * is the eve of maturity. If delayed too long, the next crop is prevented, and the tree is productive only in the alternate years. At Aix, where the olive harvest takes place early in November, it is annual: in Languedoc, Spain, and Italy, where it is delayed till December or January, it is in alternate years. quality of the oil, also, depends upon the gathering of the fruit in the first stage of its maturity. It should be carefully plucked by the hand; and the whole harvest completed, if possible, in a day. To concoct the mucilage, and allow the water to evaporate, it is spread out, during two or three days, in beds three inches deep. The oil mill is simple. The fruit is reduced to a pulp, put into sacks of coarse linen, or feather-grass, and subjected to pressure. The oil first expressed is the purest. The oil of the kernel is said to injure that of the fruit, and cause it to become sooner rancid. The growth of olives and the manufacture of the oil offer a considerable employment to many of the inhabitants of France and Italy. The importation of olive oil into Great Britain amounted, in 1827, to about four thousand five hundred tuns, paying a duty of eight guineas per tun.

The olive grows in England; though, in the severity of our winters, it changes its character. In the south, it is an evergreen; but in England, it loses its leaves. Indeed, it needs protection even in the mildest winters; and it is only in the very warmest summers that it will produce fruit a little, which does not ripen, and is of very slight flavour.

In ancient times, especially, the olive was a tree held in the greatest veneration, for then the oil was

* Hillhouse on the Olive Tree.

employed in pouring out libations to the gods; while the branches formed the wreaths of the victors at the Olympic Games. It was also used in lubricating the human body. Some of the traditions say that it was brought out of Egypt to Athens by Cecrops; while others affirm that Hercules introduced it to Greece on his return from his expeditions ; that he planted it upon Mount Olympus, and set the first example of its use in the Games. The Greeks had a pretty and instructive fable in their mythology, on the origin of the olive. They said that Neptune, having a dispute with Minerva, as to the name of the city of Athens, it was decided by the gods that the deity who gave the best present to mankind should have the privilege in dispute. Neptune struck the shore, out of which sprung a horse; but Minerva produced an olive tree. The goddess had the triumph; for it was adjudged that Peace, of which the olive is the symbol, was infinitely better than War, to which the horse was considered as belonging, and typifying. Even in the sacred history, the olive is invested with more honour than any other tree. The patriarch Noah had sent out a dove from the ark, but she returned without any token of hope. Then He stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark; and the dove came to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive branch plucked off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from the earth."

The veneration for the olive, and also the great duration of the tree, appears from the history of one in the Acropolis at Athens. Dr. Clarke has this passage in his Travels*, in speaking of the temple of Pandrosus" Within this building, so late as the second century, was preserved the olive tree mentioned

*Vol, vi. p. 246.

by Apollodorus, which was said to be as old as the foundation of the citadel. Stuart supposed it to have stood in the portico of the temple of Pandrosus (called by him the Pandroseum) from the circumstance of the air necessary for its support, which could here be admitted between the caryatides; but instances of trees, that have been preserved to a very great age, within the interior of an edifice inclosed by walls, may be adduced."

The province of Suse, in Morocco, produces great abundance of olive oil, which is stated to be equal in quality to the best Florence oil, when it is expressed from the fruit before it becomes quite ripe. Mr. Jackson, in his Account of the Empire of Morocco,' mentions a curious circumstance regarding an extensive plantation of olive-trees in the neighbourhood of Messa, which indicates the great facility with which this tree may be propagated. Being struck with the whimsical arrangement of this large plantation, he inquired the cause of their being so arranged, which was thus explained:— I learnt from the viceroy's aide-de-camp, who attended me, that one of the kings of the dynasty of Saddia, being on his journey to Soudan, encamped here with his army; that the pegs with which the cavalry picketed their horses were cut from the olive trees in the neighbourhood; and that these pegs being left in the ground on account of some sudden cause of the departure of the army, the olive trees in question sprung up from them. I confess, while I acknowledged the ingenuity of the idea, (for the disposition of the trees exactly resembled the arrangement of cavalry in an encampment,) I treated it as fabulous: some time afterwards, however, the following circumstance occurred, which induced me to think the story was not only plausible, but very credible. Having occasion to send for some plants for a garden which I had at Agadeer, or Santa Cruz,

the foulah (gardener) brought, amongst other things, a few bits of wood, without any roots or leaf, about eighteen inches long and three in circumference, which he with a large stone knocked into the ground. Seeing the fellow thus employed, I asked him what he meant by trifling in that way? I am not trifling,' said he, but planting your pomegranate trees.' I began to take them out of the ground; but some persons who were near assuring me that it was the mode in which they were always planted, and that they would (with the blessing of God) take root and shoot forth leaves the next year, I was at length prevailed on to leave a few in the ground, merely for experiment; and they certainly did take root, and were in a fair way of becoming good trees when I left Santa Cruz."

CHAPTER VI.

NUTS.-WALNUT; CHESNUT; HAZEL-NUT.

a. Walnut. b. Chesnut. c. Hazel-nut.

NUTS, properly so called, are hard dry fruits, containing one or two seeds, and not in any degree fleshy or pulpy. They are often surrounded by a leafy or woody husk, which is called the involucre, enlarged as a covering to the fruit. The kernels of all the esculent nuts are considered as being very nutritious, on account of the quantity of oil that they contain; but on that account they are less digestible than any other vegetable matters. As some of the principal kinds have been already described with considerable minuteness as trees, a very brief account of such will be given.

THE WALNUT Juglans regia.

The nuts of this tree have, when perfectly ripe, a very agreeable flavour; and the tree being besides