25. The Citron was next mentioned.--And with respect to this fruit there was a great discussion among the Deipnosophists, as to whether there is any mention made of it by the ancients. For Myrtilus said, proposing, as it were, to send us who made the inquiry to feed among the wild goats, that Hegesander the Delphian, in his Memorials, does make mention of this fruit; but that he did not recollect the exact words: and Plutarch, contradicting him, said,--But I indeed contend, that Hegesander never mentions the citron at all, for I read through the whole of his Memorials for the express purpose of seeing whether he did or no; since some other of our companions also asserted positively that he did, trusting to some scholastic commentaries of a man whom he considered respectable enough. So that it is time for you, my good friend Myrtilus, to seek for some other witness. But Æmilianus said, that Jobas the king of the Mauritanians, a man of the most extensive learning, in his History of Libya, does mention the citron, saying that it is called among the Libyans the Hesperian apple, and that they were citrons which Hercules carried into Greece, and which obtained the name of _golden_ apples on account of their colour and appearance. But the fruit which is called the apples of the Hesperides, is said to have been produced by Terra, on the occasion of the marriage of Jupiter and Juno, according to the statement of Asclepiades, in the sixtieth book of his History of the Affairs of Egypt. On this, Democritus, looking towards the speakers, said,--If, indeed, Jobas asserts any of these things, let him take pleasure in his Libyan books, and in the nonsense of Hanno. But I repeat the assertion, that the name _citron_ does not occur in the old authors. But the fruit which is described by Theophrastus the Eresian, in his Histories of Plants, is described in such a manner as to compel me to believe that he intended the citron by what he said.