The following kinds receive their respective names from their native countries: the Amerinian,[1830] the latest pear of all, the Picentine, the Numantine, the Alexandrian, the Numidian, the Greek, a variety of which is the Tarentine, and the Signine,[1831] by some called “testaceum,” from its colour, like earthenware; a reason which has also given their respective names to the “onychine”[1832] and the “purple” kinds. Then, again, we have the “myrapium,”[1833] the “laureum,” and the “nardinum,”[1834] so called from the odour they emit; the “hordearium,”[1835] from the season at which it comes[1836] in; and the “ampullaceum,”[1837] so called from its long narrow neck. Those, again, that are known as the “Coriolanian”[1838] and the “Bruttian,” owe their names to the places of their origin; added to which we have the cucurbitinum,[1839] and the “acidulum,” so named from the acidity of its juice. It is quite uncertain for what reason their respective names were given to the varieties known as the “barbaricum” and the “Venerium,”[1840] which last is known also as the “coloratum;”[1841] the royal pear[1842] too, which has a remarkably short stalk, and will stand on its end, as also the patricium, and the voconium,[1843] a green oblong kind. In addition to these, Virgil[1844] has made mention of a pear called the “volema,”[1845] a name which he has borrowed from Cato,[1846] who makes mention also of kinds known as the “sementivum”[1847] and the “musteum.”[1848]
CHAP. 17.—VARIOUS METHODS OF GRAFTING TREES. EXPIATIONS FOR LIGHTNING.
This branch of civilized life has long since been brought to the very highest pitch of perfection, for man has left nothing untried here. Hence it is that we find Virgil[1849] speaking of grafting the nut-tree on the arbutus, the apple on the plane, and the cherry on the elm. Indeed, there is nothing further in this department that can possibly be devised, and it is a long time since any new variety of fruit has been discovered. Religious scruples, too, will not allow of indiscriminate grafting; thus, for instance, it is not permitted to graft upon the thorn, for it is not easy, by any mode of expiation, to avoid the disastrous effects of lightning; and we are told[1850] that as many as are the kinds of trees that have been engrafted on the thorn, so many are the thunderbolts that will be hurled against that spot in a single flash.
The form of the pear is turbinated; the later kinds remain on the parent tree till winter, when they ripen with the frost; such, for instance, as the Greek variety, the ampullaceum, and the laureum; the same, too, with apples of the Amerinian and the Scandian kinds. Apples and pears are prepared for keeping just like grapes, and in as many different ways; but, with the exception of plums, they are the only fruit that are stored in casks.[1851] Apples and pears have certain vinous[1852] properties, and like wine these drinks are forbidden to invalids by the physicians. These fruits are sometimes boiled up with wine and water, and so make a preserve[1853] that is eaten with bread; a preparation which is never made of any other fruit, with the exception of the quinces, known as the “cotoneum” and the “strutheum.”
CHAP. 18. (16.)—THE MODE OF KEEPING VARIOUS FRUITS AND GRAPES.
For the better preserving of fruits it is universally recommended that the storeroom should be situate in a cool, dry spot, with a well-boarded floor, and windows looking towards the north; which in fine weather ought to be kept open. Care should also be taken to keep out the south wind by window panes,[1854] while at the same time it should be borne in mind that a north-east wind will shrivel fruit and make it unsightly. Apples are gathered after the autumnal equinox; but the gathering should never begin before the sixteenth day of the moon, or before the first hour of the day. Windfalls should always be kept separate, and there ought to be a layer of straw, or else mats or chaff, placed beneath. They should, also, be placed apart from each other, in rows, so that the air may circulate freely between them, and they may equally gain the benefit of it. The Amerinian apple is the best keeper, the melimelum the very worst of all.
(17.) Quinces ought to be stored in a place kept perfectly closed, so as to exclude all draughts; or else they should be boiled in honey[1855] or soaked in it. Pomegranates are made hard and firm by being first put in boiling[1856] sea-water, and then left to dry for three days in the sun, care being taken that the dews of the night do not touch them; after which they are hung up, and when wanted for use, washed with fresh water. M. Varro[1857] recommends that they should be kept in large vessels filled with sand: if they are not ripe, he says that they should be put in pots with the bottom broken out, and then buried[1858] in the earth, all access to the air being carefully shut, and care being first taken to cover the stalk with pitch. By this mode of treatment, he assures us, they will attain a larger size than they would if left to ripen on the tree. As for the other kinds of pomes, he says that they should be wrapped up separately in fig-leaves, the windfalls being carefully excluded, and then stored in baskets of osier, or else covered over with potters’ earth.
Pears are kept in earthen vessels pitched inside; when filled, the vessels are reversed and then buried in pits. The Tarentine pear, Varro says, is gathered very late, while the Anician keeps very well in raisin wine. Sorb apples, too, are similarly kept in holes in the ground, the vessel being turned upside down, and a layer of plaster placed on the lid: it should be buried two feet deep, in a sunny spot; sorbs[1859] are also hung, like grapes, in the inside of large vessels, together with the branches.
Some of the more recent authors are found to pay a more scrupulous degree of attention to these various particulars, and recommend that the gathering of grapes or pomes, which are intended for keeping, should take place while the moon is on the wane,[1860] after the third hour of the day, and while the weather is clear, or dry winds prevail. In a similar manner, the selection, they say, ought to be made from a dry spot, and the fruit should be plucked before it is fully ripe, a moment being chosen while the moon is below the horizon. Grapes, they say, should be selected that have a strong, hard mallet-stalk, and after the decayed berries have been carefully removed with a pair of scissors, they should be hung up inside of a large vessel which has just been pitched, care being taken to close all access to the south wind, by covering the lid with a coat of plaster. The same method, they say, should be adopted for keeping sorb apples and pears, the stalks being carefully covered with pitch; care should be taken, too, that the vessels are kept at a distance from water.
There are some persons who adopt the following method for preserving grapes. They take them off together with the branch, and place them, while still upon it, in a layer of plaster,[1861] taking care to fasten either end of the branch in a bulb of squill.[1862] Others, again, go so far as to place them within vessels containing wine, taking care, however, that the grapes, as they hang, do not touch it. Some persons put apples in plates of earth, and then leave them to float in wine, a method by which it is thought that a vinous flavour is imparted to them: while some think it a better plan to preserve all these kinds of fruit in millet. [Most] people, however, content themselves with first digging a hole in the ground, a couple of feet in depth; a layer of sand is then placed at the bottom, and the fruit is arranged upon it, and covered with an earthen lid, over which the earth is thrown. Some persons again even go so far as to give their grapes a coating of potters’ chalk, and then hang them up when dried in the sun; when required for use, the chalk is removed with water.[1863] Apples are also preserved in a similar manner; but with them wine is employed for getting off the chalk. Indeed, we find a very similar plan pursued with apples of the finest quality; they have a coating laid upon them of either plaster or wax; but they are apt, if not quite ripe when this was done, by the increase in their size to break their casing.[1864] When apples are thus prepared, they are always laid with the stalk downwards.[1865] Some persons pluck the apple together with the branch, the ends of which they thrust into the pith of elder,[1866] and then bury it in the way already pointed out.[1867] There are some who assign to each apple or pear its separate vessel of clay, and after carefully pitching the cover, enclose it again in a larger vessel: occasionally, too, the fruit is placed on a layer of flocks of wool, or else in baskets,[1868] with a lining of chaff and clay. Other persons follow a similar plan, but use earthen plates for the purpose; while others, again, employ the same method, but dig a hole in the earth, and after placing a layer of sand, lay the fruit on top of it, and then cover the whole with dry earth. Persons, too, are sometimes known to give quinces a coating of Pontic[1869] wax, and then plunge them in honey.