quin et caudicibus sectis, mirabile dictu, truditur e sicco radix oleagina ligno.
The stock in slices cut, and forth shall shoot, O passing strange! from each dry slice a root (Holden).
See John Martyn ad loc.: "La Cerda says, that what the Poet here speaks of was practised in Spain in his time. They take the trunk of an olive, says he, deprive it of its root and branches, and cut it into several pieces, which they put into the ground, whence a root and, soon afterwards, a tree is formed." This mode of propagating by dry pieces of the trunk (with bark on) is not to be confounded with that of "truncheons" mentioned in "Georg." ii. 63.
(21) See Theophr. "H. Pl." ii. 2, 4; "de Caus." iii. 5. 1; "Geopon."
ix. 11. 4, ap. Hold.; Col. v. 9. 1; xi. 2. 42.
(22) Or, "covered up for protection."
Soc. Yes, all these things I see.
Isch. Granted, you see: what is there in the matter that you do not understand? Perhaps you are ignorant how you are to lay the potsherd on the clay at top?
Soc. No, in very sooth, not ignorant of that Ischomachus, or anything you mentioned. That is just the puzzle, and again I beat my brains to discover why, when you put to me that question a while back: "Had I, in brief, the knowledge how to plant?" I answered, "No." Till then it never would have struck me that I could say at all how planting must be done. But no sooner do you begin to question me on each particular point than I can answer you; and what is more, my answers are, you tell me, accordant with the views of an authority (23) at once so skilful and so celebrated as yourself. Really, Ischomachus, I am disposed to ask: "Does teaching consist in putting questions?" (24) Indeed, the secret of your system has just this instant dawned upon me. I seem to see the principle in which you put your questions. You lead me through the field of my own knowledge, (25) and then by pointing out analogies (26) to what I know, persuade me that I really know some things which hitherto, as I believed, I had no knowledge of.
(23) Or, "whose skill in farming is proverbial."
(24) Lit. "Is questioning after all a kind of teaching?" See Plat.
"Meno"; "Mem." IV. vi. 15.
(25) It appears, then, that the Xenophontean Socrates has {episteme}
of a sort.
(26) Or, "a series of resemblances," "close parallels," reading
{epideiknus}: or if with Breit. {apodeiknus}, transl. "by proving
such or such a thing is like some other thing known to me
already."
Isch. Do you suppose if I began to question you concerning money and its quality, (27) I could possibly persuade you that you know the method to distinguish good from false coin? Or could I, by a string of questions about flute-players, painters, and the like, induce you to believe that you yourself know how to play the flute, or paint, and so forth?
(27) Lit. "whether it is good or not."