I found this great piece just today. I hope you enjoy it like I did!
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The Story of the Talon Family -The Truffle and the Oak—The Truffle a Parasite—Formation of a Nursery—When the Truffle is Ripe—The Pig as Truffle-Hunter—Dogs Employed—The Growth of the Tuber—The Preservation of the Truffle—Commerce in Truffles— Cahors—Its Market — Italian Truffles — Fattening of Geese for pate' lie foie gras.
In the year 1810 there lived in the hamlet of Talons, at St. Talons, at St. Saturnin-lez-Apt, in Provence, two men, cousins, bearing the same name of Joseph Talon; the one was the son of Peter Talon, the other of Anthony. Joseph, son of Peter, had some land that produced nothing, and, rather than that it should remain unprofitable, he sowed it with acorns, thinking to feed his pigs from the trees when they bore. Bear they did, in the course of time; but what was his astonishment, when he turned his pigs in among them, to find that they bore something far more profitable than acorns, viz. truffles. They did not, indeed, bear them on their branches, but about their roots. This was indeed a discovery. Joseph now gathered carefully every acorn from his little plantation and sowed a fresh patch of ground, and carefully also destroyed every acorn he did not plant, lest his neighbours should obtain any of this precious truffle-bearing tree. He went on sowing every parcel of his little property with glands, and as the oak trees grew, they produced truffles. That was the beginning of his fortune. Years after he took his children to look at his plantations, and said to them, "Every man is sent into the world for some purpose: I was sent for this."
But the secret could not be hidden. The villagers marvelled to see how eager Joseph was to plant oak trees, and they watched him closely. His cousin Joseph, son of Anthony, detected him destroying his acorns, and as it was now well known that Joseph, son of Peter, sold truffles, it was concluded that he had discovered a sort of truffle-bearing oak. Now, truffles fetch a high price—a sovereign for a kilo; that is a little over two pounds. The neighbours of Talon, above all his cousin, followed his course—they sought out oaks about whose roots truffles grew, and sowed their land with their glands. They also, in course of time, reaped a harvest, as had the discoverer. That was the beginning of truffle culture, which is now assuming some proportions in that part of France where the vines have been destroyed by the phylloxera, and plantations of oak are taking the place of vineyards.
But what connection has the truffle with the oak? That has long been a puzzle. Where no oak trees growbut, indeed, a few other trees, such as the nut and the poplar—there are also truffles. In certain soils, in certain climates, as surely as oaks are planted, so surely in ten or twelve years do truffles arrive. Cut down an oak wood that has yielded a harvest of this precious tuber, and the truffle disappears.
When Pliny said that the truffle was the curdling of the soil, under a lightning flash, he talked nonsense. He had not subjected the truffle to observation, and he ventured on a guess. The peasants, who for many centuries have made money by collecting truffles, formed their own theory to explain the existence of these products of nature. They asserted that the truffle was an underground oak-gall, due to the puncturing of the roots by a little fly that they observed hovering in the shade of the oak, and was a sure indication of the presence of truffles beneath the soil. Their theory was better than the guess of Pliny, for it was based on observation and showed reason. Nevertheless, it is false; but its falsity has been demonstrated only of quite late years.
The true position of the truffle has been determined by science with the aid of the microscope, and it has been proved that it is a subterranean mushroom—a parasite on the fibrous roots of the" oak.
The truffle is a parasite, or of semi-parasitic life, on the tender fibrous roots of the young oak, the nut tree, the poplar, and a few other trees. Moreover, of truffles there are many kinds, none absolutely poisonous, but two only come into the market, the winter and the summer truffles, the black and the grey.
The truffle is of the nature and order of the mushroom, and it grows from spores as does the mushroom. The latter carries its seeds in the delicate radiating films under its umbrella, whereas those of the truffle are contained within its fleshy mass, and are liberated only by the decomposition of the flesh.
It has no roots perceptible to the eye, when taken out of the ground; it has, nevertheless, filaments very fine and delicate, with which it draws its nourishment from the oak and from the soil, and these are atrophied when it reaches maturity.
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Part II comes tomorrow!
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