Part 30

See Leake, "Topog. of Athens," i. 209.

Or, "the Phaleric marsh-land." See Leake, ib. 231, 427; ii. 9.

Isch. In planting, would you dig (what I may call) deep trenches in a dry soil or a moist?

Soc. In a dry soil certainly; at any rate, if you set about to dig deep trenches in the moist you will come to water, and there and then an end to further planting.

Isch. You could not put it better. We will suppose, then, the trenches have been dug. Does your eyesight take you further? Have you noticed at what season in either case the plants must be embedded?

Lit. "As soon as the trenches have been dug then, have you further noticed..."

(1) The vulg. reading {openika... ekatera} = "at what precise time... either (i.e. 'the two different' kinds of) plant," i.e. "vine and olive" or "vine and fig," I suppose; (2) Breit. emend. {opotera... en ekatera} = "which kind of plant... in either soil..."; (3) Schenkl. etc., {openika... en ekatera} = "at what season... in each of the two sorts of soil..."

Soc. Certainly.

There is an obvious lacuna either before or after this remark, or at both places.

Isch. Supposing, then, you wish the plants to grow as fast as possible: how will the cutting strike and sprout, do you suppose, most readily?--after you have laid a layer of soil already worked beneath it, and it merely has to penetrate soft mould? or when it has to force its way through unbroken soil into the solid ground?

Soc. Clearly it will shoot through soil which has been worked more quickly than through unworked soil.

Isch. Well then, a bed of earth must be laid beneath the plant?

Soc. I quite agree; so let it be.

Isch. And how do you expect your cutting to root best?--if set straight up from end to end, pointing to the sky? or if you set it slantwise under its earthy covering, so as to lie like an inverted gamma?

Lit. "if you set the whole cutting straight up, facing heavenwards."

i.e. Anglice, "like the letter {G} upon its back" {an inverted "upper-case" gamma looks like an L}. See Lord Bacon, "Nat. Hist." Cent. v. 426: "When you would have many new roots of fruit-trees, take a low tree and bow it and lay all his branches aflat upon the ground and cast earth upon them; and every twig will take root. And this is a very profitable experiment for costly trees (for the boughs will make stock without charge), such as are apricots, peaches, almonds, cornelians, mulberries, figs, etc. The like is continually practised with vines, roses, musk roses, etc."

Soc. Like an inverted gamma, to be sure, for so the plant must needs have more eyes under ground. Now it is from these same eyes of theirs, if I may trust my own, that plants put forth their shoots above ground. I imagine, therefore, the eyes still underground will do the same precisely, and with so many buds all springing under earth, the plant itself, I argue, as a whole will sprout and shoot and push its way with speed and vigour.

Lit. "it is from their eyes, I see, that plants..."

Isch. I may tell you that on these points, too, your judgment tallies with my own. But now, should you content yourself with merely heaping up the earth, or will you press it firmly round your plant?

Soc. I should certainly press down the earth; for if the earth is not pressed down, I know full well that at one time under the influence of rain the unpressed soil will turn to clay or mud; at another, under the influence of the sun, it will turn to sand or dust to the very bottom: so that the poor plant runs a risk of being first rotted with moisture by the rain, and next of being shrivelled up with drought through overheating of the roots.

Through "there being too much bottom heat." Holden (ed. 1886).

Isch. So far as the planting of vines is concerned, it appears, Socrates, that you and I again hold views precisely similar.

And does this method of planting apply also to the fig-tree? (I inquired).

Isch. Surely, and not to the fig-tree alone, but to all the rest of fruit-trees. What reason indeed would there be for rejecting in the case of other plant-growths what is found to answer so well with the vine?

{akrodrua} = "edible fruits" in Xenophon's time. See Plat. "Criti." 115 B; Dem. "c. Nicostr." 1251; Aristot. "Hist. An." viii. 28. 8, {out akrodrua out opora khronios}; Theophr. "H. Pl." iv. 4. 11. (At a later period, see "Geopon." x. 74, = "fruits having a hard rind or shell," e.g. nuts, acorns, as opposed to pears, apples, grapes, etc., {opora}.) See further the interesting regulations in Plat. "Laws," 844 D, 845 C.

Lit. "planting in general."

Soc. How shall we plant the olive, pray, Ischomachus?

Isch. I see your purpose. You ask that question with a view to put me to the test, when you know the answer yourself as well as possible. You can see with your own eyes that the olive has a deeper trench dug, planted as it is so commonly by the side of roads. You can see that all the young plants in the nursery adhere to stumps. And lastly, you can see that a lump of clay is placed on the head of every plant, and the portion of the plant above the soil is protected by a wrapping.