BOOK I

[Transcriber's note: The extensive and lengthy footnotes have been

renumbered and placed at the end of the book.]

ROMAN FARM MANAGEMENT

THE TREATISES OF CATO AND VARRO

DONE INTO ENGLISH, WITH NOTES OF MODERN INSTANCES

BY A VIRGINIA FARMER

1918

PREFACE

The present editor made the acquaintance of Cato and Varro standing at

a book stall on the Quai Voltaire in Paris, and they carried him away

in imagination, during a pleasant half hour, not to the vineyards and

olive yards of Roman Italy, but to the blue hills of a far distant

Virginia where the corn was beginning to tassel and the fat cattle

were loafing in the pastures. Subsequently, when it appeared that

there was then no readily available English version of the Roman

agronomists, this translation was made, in the spirit of old Piero

Vettori, the kindly Florentine scholar, whose portrait was painted by

Titian and whose monument may still be seen in the Church of Santo

Spirito: in the preface of his edition of Varro he says that he

undertook the work, not for the purpose of displaying his learning,

but to aid others in the study of an excellent author. Victorius was

justified by his scholarship and the present editor has no such

claim to attention: he, therefore, makes the confession frankly (to

anticipate perhaps such criticism as Bentley's "a very pretty poem,

Mr. Pope, but don't call it Homer") and offers the little book to

those who love the country, and to read about the country amidst the

crowded life of towns, with the hope that they may find in it some

measure of the pleasure it has afforded the editor.

The texts and commentaries used have been those of Schneider and Keil,

the latter more accurate but the former more sympathetic.

F.H. BELVOIR,

Fauquier County,

Virginia.

December, 1912.

FOREWORD TO SECOND EDITION

The call for a reprint of this book has afforded the opportunity to

correct some errors and to make several additions to the notes.

In withholding his name from the title page the editor sought not so

much to conceal his identity as to avoid the appearance of a parade in

what was to him the unwonted field of polite literature. As, however,

he is neither ashamed of the book nor essays the _rôle_ of

A violet by a mossy stone

Half hidden from the eye,

he now and here signs his name.

FAIRFAX HARRISON.

BELVOIR HOUSE,

Christmas, 1917.

CONTENTS

NOTE UPON THE ROMAN AGRONOMISTS

NOTE ON THE OBLIGATION OF VIRGIL TO VARRO

* * * * *

CATO'S _DE AGRICULTURA_

SYNOPSIS

Introduction: Of the Dignity of the Farmer

Of Buying a Farm

Of the Duties of the Owner

Of Laying out the Farm

Of Stocking the Farm

Of the Duties of the Overseer

Of the Duties of the Housekeeper

Of the Hands

Of Draining

Of Preparing the Seed Bed

Of Manure

Of Soil Improvement

Of Forage Crops

Of Planting

Of Pastures

Of Feeding Live Stock

Of the Care of Live Stock

Of Cakes and Salad

Of Curing Hams

VARRO'S _RERUM RUSTICARUM LIBRI TRES_

SYNOPSIS

BOOK I

THE HUSBANDRY OF AGRICULTURE

CHAPTER

I. Introduction: the literary tradition of country life

Of the definition of Agriculture:

II. a. What it is not

III. b. What it is

IV. The purposes of Agriculture are profit and pleasure

V. The four-fold division of the study of Agriculture

_I° Concerning the farm itself_:

VI. How conformation of the land affects Agriculture

VII. How character of soil affects Agriculture

VIII. (A digression on the maintenance of vineyards)

IX. Of the different kinds of soils

X. Of the units of area used in measuring land

Of the considerations on building a steading:

XI. a. Size

b. Water supply

XII. c. Location, with regard to health

XIII. d. Arrangement

Of the protection of farm boundaries:

XIV. a. Fences

XV. b. Monuments

XVI. Of the considerations of neighbourhood

_2° Concerning the equipment of a farm_:

XVII. }

& }Of agricultural labourers

XVIII.}

XIX. }

& }Of draught animals

XX. }

XXI. Of watch dogs

XXII. Of farming implements

_3° Concerning the operation of a farm_:

XXIII. Of planting field crops

XXIV. Of planting olives

XXV. }

& } Of planting vines

XXVI.}

_4° Concerning the agricultural seasons_:

XXVII. }

& }Of the solar measure of the year, illustrated by

XXVIII.}

A CALENDAR OF AGRICULTURAL OPERATIONS

throughout the year, in eight seasons, viz:

XXIX. 1° February 7-March 24

XXX. 2° March 24-May 7

XXXI. 3° May 7-June 24

XXXII. 4° June 24-July 21

XXXIII. 5° July 21-September 26

XXXIV. 6° September 26-October 28

XXXV. 7° October 28-December 24

XXXVI. 8° December 24-February 7

XXXVII. Of the influence of the moon on Agriculture to which is added

ANOTHER CALENDAR OF SIX AGRICULTURAL SEASONS

with a commentary on their several occupations, viz:

CHAPTER

_1° Preparing time_:

Of tillage,

XXXVIII. Of manuring,

XXXIX. _2° Planting time_:

Of the four methods of propagating plants, viz:

XL. a. Seeding and here of seed selection

b. Transplanting

c. Cuttage

d. Graftage, and

e. A "new" method, inarching

XLI. Of when to use these different methods

XLII. Of seeding alfalfa

XLIII. Of seeding clover and cabbage

XLIV. Of seeding grain

_3° Cultivating time_:

XLV. Of the conditions of plant growth

XLVI. Of the mechanical action of plants

XLVII. Of the protection of nurseries and meadows

XLVIII. Of the structure of a wheat plant

XLIX. _4° Harvest time_:

Of the hay harvest

L. Of the wheat harvest

LI. The threshing floor

LII. Threshing and winnowing

LIII. Gleaning

LIV. Of the vintage

LV. Of the olive harvest

_5° Housing time_:

LVI. Of storing hay

LVII. Of storing grain

LVIII. Of storing legumes

LIX. Of storing pome fruits

LX. Of storing olives

LXI. Of storing amurca

LXII. _6° Consuming time_:

LXIII. Of cleaning grain

LXIV. Of condensing amurca

LXV. Of racking wine

LXVL. Of preserved olives

LXVIL. Of nuts, dates and figs

LXVIII. Of stored fruits

LXIX. Of marketing grain

Epilogue: the dangers of the streets of Rome

BOOK II

THE HUSBANDRY OF LIVE STOCK

Introduction:--the decay of country life

I. Of the origin, the importance and the economy of live stock husbandry

II. Of sheep

III. Of goats

IV. Of swine

V. Of neat cattle

VI. Of asses

VII. Of horses

VIII. Of mules

IX. Of herd dogs

N. Of shepherds

XI. Of milk and cheese and wool

BOOK III

THE HUSBANDRY OF THE STEADING

I. Introduction: the antiquity of country life

II. Of the definition of a Roman villa

III. Of the Roman development of the industries of the steading

IV. Of aviaries

V. a. for profit

b. for pleasure (including here the description of Varro's own aviary)

VI. Of pea-cocks

VII. Of pigeons

VIII. Of turtle doves

IX. Of poultry

X. Of geese

XI. Of ducks

XII. Of rabbits

XIII. Of game preserves

XIV. Of snails

XV. Of dormice

XVI. Of bees

XVII. Of fish ponds

INDEX.

ROMAN FARM MANAGEMENT

NOTE UPON THE ROMAN AGRONOMISTS

Quaecunque autem propter disciplinam ruris nostrorum temporum cum

priscis discrepant, non deterrere debent a lectione discentem. Nam

multo plura reperiuntur, apud veteres, quae nobis probanda sint,

quam quae repudianda.

COLUMELLA I, I.

The study of the Roman treatises on farm management is profitable to

the modern farmer however practical and scientific he may be. He will

not find in them any thing about bacteria and the "nodular hypothesis"

in respect of legumes, nor any thing about plant metabolism, nor even

any thing about the effects of creatinine on growth and absorption;

but, important and fascinating as are the illuminations of modern

science upon practical agriculture, the intelligent farmer with

imagination (every successful farmer has imagination, whether or not

he is intelligent) will find some thing quite as important to his

welfare in the body of Roman husbandry which has come down to us,

namely: a background for his daily routine, an appreciation that two

thousand years ago men were studying the same problems and solving

them by intelligent reasoning. Columella well says that in reading

the ancient writers we may find in them more to approve than to

disapprove, however much our new science may lead us to differ from

them in practice. The characteristics of the Roman methods of farm

management, viewed in the light of the present state of the art in

America, were thoroughness and patience. The Romans had learned many

things which we are now learning again, such as green manuring with

legumes, soiling, seed selection, the testing of soil for sourness,

intensive cultivation of a fallow as well as of a crop, conservative

rotation, the importance of live stock in a system of general farming,

the preservation of the chemical content of manure and the composting

of the rubbish of a farm, but they brought to their farming operations

some thing more which we have not altogether learned--the character

which made them a people of enduring achievement. Varro quotes one of

their proverbs "Romanus sedendo vincit," which illustrates my present

point. The Romans achieved their results by thoroughness and patience.

It was thus that they defeated Hannibal and it was thus that they

built their farm houses and fences, cultivated their fields, their

vineyards and their oliveyards, and bred and fed their live stock.

They seem to have realized that there are no short cuts in the

processes of nature, and that the law of compensations is invariable.

The foundation of their agriculture was the fallow[1] and one finds

them constantly using it as a simile--in the advice not to breed a

mare every year, as in that not to exact too much tribute from a bee

hive. Ovid even warns a lover to allow fallow seasons to intervene in

his courtship.

While one can find instruction in their practice even today, one

can benefit even more from their agricultural philosophy, for the

characteristic of the American farmer is that he is in too much of a

hurry.

The ancient literature of farm management was voluminous. Varro cites

fifty Greek authors on the subject whose works he knew, beginning with

Hesiod and Xenophon. Mago of Carthage wrote a treatise in the Punic

tongue which was so highly esteemed that the Roman Senate ordered it

translated into Latin, but, like most of the Greeks,[2] it is now lost

to us except in the literary tradition.

Columella says that it was Cato who taught Agriculture to speak Latin.

Cato's book, written in the middle of the second century B. C, was the

first on the subject in Latin; indeed, it was one of the very first

books written in that vernacular at all. Of the other Latin writers

whose bucolic works have survived, Varro and Virgil wrote at the

beginning of the Augustan Age and were followed by the Spanish

Columella under Tiberius, and by Pliny (with his Natural History)

under Titus. After them (and "a long way after," as Mr. Punch says)

came in the fourth century the worthy but dull Palladius, who supplied

the hornbook used by the agricultural monks throughout the Dark Ages.

MARCUS PORCIUS CATO (B.C. 234-149), known in history as the elder

Cato, was the type of Roman produced by the most vigorous days of

the Republic. Born at Tusculum on the narrow acres which his peasant

forefathers had tilled in the intervals of military service, he

commenced advocate at the country assizes, followed his fortunes to

Rome and there became a leader of the metropolitan bar. He saw gallant

military service in Spain and in Greece, commanded an army, held all

the curule offices of state and ended a contentious life in the Senate

denouncing Carthage and the degeneracy of the times.

He was an upstanding man, but as coarse as he was vigorous in mind and

in body. Roman literature is full of anecdotes about him and his wise

and witty sayings.

Unlike many men who have devoted a toilsome youth to agricultural

labour, when he attained fame and fortune he maintained his interest

in his farm, and wrote his _De re rustica_ in green old age. It tells

what sort of farm manager he himself was, or wanted to be thought to

be, and, though a mere collection of random notes, sets forth more

shrewd common sense and agricultural experience than it is possible to

pack into the same number of English words. It remains today of much

more than antiquarian interest.

MARCUS TERENTIUS VARRO (B.C. 116-28) whom Quintilian called "the most

learned of the Romans," and Petrarch "il terzo gran lume Romano,"

ranking him with Cicero and Virgil, probably studied agriculture

before he studied any thing else, for he was born on a Sabine farm,

and although of a well to do family, was bred in the habits of

simplicity and rural industry with which the poets have made that

name synonymous. All his life he amused the leisure snatched from his

studies with intelligent supervision of the farming of his several

estates: and he wrote his treatise _Rerum Rusticarum_ in his eightieth

year.[3]

He had his share of active life, but it was as a scholar that he

distinguished himself.[4] Belonging to the aristocratic party, he

became a friend and supporter of Pompey, and, after holding a naval

command under him in the war against the Pirates in B.C. 67, was

his legatus in Spain at the beginning of the civil wars and there

surrendered to Caesar. He was again on the losing side at the battle

of Pharsalia, but was pardoned by Caesar, who selected him to be

librarian of the public library he proposed to establish at Rome.[5]

From this time Varro eschewed politics and devoted himself to letters,

although his troubles were not yet at an end: after the death of

Caesar, the ruthless Antony despoiled his villa at Casinum (where

Varro had built the aviary described in book Three), and like Cicero

he was included in the proscriptions which followed the compact of the

triumvirs, but in the end unlike Cicero he escaped and spent his last

years peacefully at his villas at Cumae and Tusculum.

His literary activity was astonishing: he wrote at least six hundred

books covering a wide range of antiquarian research. St. Augustine,

who dearly loved to turn a balanced phrase, says that Varro had read

so much that it is difficult to understand when he found time to

write, while on the other hand he wrote so much that one can scarcely

read all his books. Cicero, who claimed him as an intimate friend,

describes (_Acad_. Ill) what Varro had written before B.C. 46, but he

went on producing to the end of his long life, eighteen years later:

"For," says Cicero, "while we are sojourners, so to speak, in our own

city and wandering about like strangers, your books have conducted us,

as it were, home again, so as to enable us at last to recognize who

and whence we are. You have discussed the antiquities of our country

and the variety of dates and chronology relating to it. You have

explained the laws which regulate sacrifices and priests: you have

unfolded the customs of the city both in war and peace: you have

described the various quarters and districts: you have omitted

mentioning none of the names, or kinds, or functions, or causes of

divine or human things: you have thrown a flood of light on our poets

and altogether on Latin literature and the Latin language: you have

yourself composed a poem of varied beauties and elegant in almost

every part: and you have in many places touched upon philosophy in

a manner sufficient to excite our curiosity, though inadequate to

instruct us."

Of Varro's works, beside the _Rerum Rusticarum_, there have survived

only fragments, including a considerable portion of the treatise

on the Latin language: the story is that most of his books were

deliberately destroyed at the procurement of the Church (something

not impossible, as witness the Emperor Theodosius in _Corpus Juris

Civilis_. Cod. Lib. I, tit. I, cap. 3, § I) to conceal St. Augustine's

plagiarism from them; yet the _De Civitate Dei_, which is largely

devoted to refuting Varro's pagan theology, is a perennial monument to

his fame. St. Augustine says (VI, 2): "Although his elocution has less

charm, he is so full of learning and philosophy that ... he instructs

the student of facts as much as Cicero delights the student of style."

Varro's treatise on farm management is the best practical book on

the subject which has come down to us from antiquity. It has not the

spontaneous originality of Cato, nor the detail and suave elegance of

Columella. Walter Harte in his _Essays on Husbandry_ (1764) says

that Cato writes like an English squire and Varro like a French

academician. This is just comment on Cato but it is at once too much

and too little to say of Varro: a French academician might be proud

of his antiquarian learning, but would balk at his awkward and homely

Latin, as indeed one French academician, M. Boissier, has since done.

The real merit of Varro's book is that it is the well digested system

of an experienced and successful farmer who has seen and practised all

that he records.

The authority from which Virgil drew the practical farming lore, for

which he has been extolled in all ages, was Varro: indeed, as a farm

manual the _Georgics_ go astray only when they depart from Varro. It

is worth while to elaborate this point, which Professor Sellar, in his

argument for the originality of Virgil, only suggests.[6]

After Philippi the times were ripe for books on agriculture. The Roman

world had been divided between Octavian and Antony and there was peace

in Italy: men were turning "back to the land."

An agricultural regeneration of Italy was impending, chiefly in

viticulture, as Ferrero has pointed out. With far sighted appreciation

of the economic advantages of this, Octavian determined to promote the

movement, which became one of the completed glories of the Augustan

Age, when Horace sang

Tua, Caesar, aetas

Fruges et agris rettulit uberes.

Varro's book appeared in B.C. 37 and during that year Maecenas

commissioned Virgil to put into verse the spirit of the times; just

as, under similar circumstances, Cromwell pensioned Samuel Hartlib.

Such is the co-incidence of the dates that it is not impossible that

the _Rerum Rusticarum_ suggested the subject of the _Georgics_, either

to Virgil or to Maecenas.

There is no evidence in the _Bucolics_ that Virgil ever had any

practical knowledge of agriculture before he undertook to write the

_Georgics_. His father was, it is true, a farmer, but apparently in a

small way and unsuccessful, for he had to eke out a frugal livelihood

by keeping bees and serving as the hireling deputy of a _viator_ or

constable. This type of farmer persists and may be recognized in any

rural community: but the agricultural colleges do not enlist such

men into their faculties. So it is possible that Virgil owed little

agricultural knowledge to his father's precepts or example. Virgil

perhaps had tended his father's flock, as he pictures himself doing

under the guise of Tityrus; certainly he spent many hours of youth

"patulae recubans sub tegmine fagi" steeping his Celtic soul with the

beauty and the melancholy poetry of the Lombard landscape: and so he

came to know and to love bird and flower and the external aspects of

wheat and woodland

tilth and vineyard, hive and horse and herd,

but it does not appear that he ever followed the plough, or, what is

more important, ever laid off a ploughgate. As a poet of nature no one

was ever better equipped (the highest testimony is that of Tennyson),

but when it came to writing poetry around the art of farm management

it was necessary for him to turn to books for his facts. He

acknowledges (_Geo_. I, 176) his obligation only to _veterum

praecepta_ without naming them, but as M. Gaston Boissier says he was

evidently referring to Varro "le plus moderne de tous les anciens."[7]

Virgil evidently regarded Varro's treatise as a solid foundation for

his poem and he used it freely, just as he drew on Hesiod for literary

inspiration, on Lucretius for imaginative philosophy, and on Mago and

Cato and the two Sasernas for local colour.

Virgil probably had also the advantage of personal contact with Varro

during the seven years he was composing and polishing the _Georgics_.

He spent them largely at Naples (_Geo_. IV, 563) and Varro was then

established in retirement at Cumae: thus they were neighbours, and,

although they belonged to different political parties, the young poet

must have known and visited the old polymath; there was every

reason for him to have taken advantage of the opportunity. Whatever

justification there may be for this conjecture, the fact remains that

Varro is in the background every where throughout the _Georgics_, as

the "deadly parallel" in the appended note will indicate. This is

perhaps the most interesting thing about Varro's treatise: instructive

and entertaining as it is to the farmer, in the large sense of the

effect of literature on mankind, Virgil gave it wings--the useful cart

horse became Pegasus.

As a consequence of the chorus of praise of the _Georgics_, there have

been those, in all ages, who have sneered at Virgil's farming. The

first such _advocatus diaboli_ was Seneca, who, writing to Lucilius

(_Ep_. 86) from the farm house of Scipio Africanus, fell foul of the

advice (_Geo_, I, 216) to plant both beans and millet in the spring,

saying that he had just seen at the end of June beans gathered and

millet sowed on the same day: from which he generalized that Virgil

disregarded the truth to turn a graceful verse, and sought rather to

delight his reader than to instruct the husbandman. This kind of

cheap criticism does not increase our respect for Nero's philosophic

minister.[8] Whatever may have been Virgil's mistakes, every farmer

of sentiment should thank God that one of the greatest poems in any

language contains as much as it does of a sound tradition of the

practical side of his art, and here is where Varro is entitled to the

appreciation which is always due the schoolmaster of a genius.

NOTE ON THE OBLIGATION OF VIRGIL TO VARRO

At the beginning of the first _Georgic_ (1-5) Virgil lays out the

scope of the poem as dealing with three subjects, agriculture, the

care of live stock and the husbandry of bees. This was Varro's plan

(R.R. I, I, 2, and I, 2 passim) except that under the third head Varro

included, with bees, all the other kinds of stock which were usually

kept at a Roman steading. Varro asserts that his was the first

scientific classification of the subject ever made. Virgil (G. I,

5-13) begins too with the invocation of the Sun and the Moon and

certain rural deities, as did Varro (R.R. I, I, 4). The passages

should be compared for, as M. Gaston Boissier has pointed out, the

difference in the point of view of the two men is here illustrated

by the fact that Varro appeals to purely Roman deities, while Virgil

invokes the literary gods of Greece. Following the _Georgics_ through,

one who has studied Varro will note other passages for which a

suggestion may be found in Varro, usually in facts, but some times

in thought and even in words, viz: Before beginning his agricultural

operations a farmer should study the character of the country (G. I,

50: R.R. I, 6), the prevailing winds and the climate (G. I, 51: R.R.

I, 2, 3), the farming practice of the neighbourhood (G. I, 52: R.R. I,

18, 7), "this land is fit for corn, that for vines, and the other

for trees," (G. I, 54: R.R. I, 6, 5). He should practise fallow

and rotation (G. I, 71: R.R. I, 44, 2), and compensate the land by

planting legumes (G. I, 74: R.R. I, 23); he should irrigate his

meadows in summer (G. I, 104: R.R. I, 31, 5), and drain off surface

water in winter (G. I, 113: R.R. I, 36). Man has progressed from

a primitive state, when he subsisted on nuts and berries, to the

domestication of animals and to agriculture (G. I, 121-159: R.R. II,

1, 3). The threshing floor must be protected from pests (G. I, 178:

R.R. I, 51). Seed should be carefully selected (G. I, 197: R.R. 40,

2); the time for sowing grain is the autumn (G. I, 219: R.R. I, 34).

"Everlasting night" prevails in the Arctic regions (G. I, 247: R.R.

I, 2, 5); the importance to the farmer of the four seasons (G.I. 258;

R.R. I, 27) and the influence of the Moon (G.I. 276: R.R. I, 37).

The several methods of propagating plants described (G. II, 9-34: R.R.

I, 39), but here Varro follows Theophrastus (H.P. II, 1); trees grow

slowly from seed (G. II, 57; R.R. I, 41, 4); olives are propagated

from truncheons (G. II, 63; R.R. I, 41, 6). "The praise of Italy" (G.

II, 136-176: R.R. I, 2, 6), where trees bear twice a year (G. II, 150:

R.R. I, 7, 6). Certain plants affect certain soils (G. II, 177: R.R.

I, 9). A physical experiment (G. II, 230; R.R. I, 7); the advantage of

the quincunx in planting (G. II, 286: R.R. I, 7). Fence the vineyard

to keep out live stock (G. II, 371: R.R. I, 14); the goat a proper

sacrifice to Bacchus (G. II, 380: R.R. I, 2, 19). Be the first to put

your vine props under cover (G. II, 409: R.R. I, 8, 6).

The points of cattle (G. III, 50: R.R. II, 5, 7); their breeding age

(G. III, 61: R.R. II, 5, 13); segregate the bulls before the breeding

season (G. III, 212: R.R. II, 5, 12). Recruit your herd with fresh

blood (G. III, 69: R.R. II, 5, 17). How to break young oxen (G. III,

163: R.R. I, 20).

Of breeding live stock, the males should be fat, the females lean (G.

III, 123-129: R.R. II, 5, 12).

The points of a horse (G. III, 79: R.R. II, 7, 5). Mares fecundated by

the wind (G. III, 273: R.R. II, 1, 19). The care of the brood mare (G.

III, 138: R.R. II, 7, 10). The bearing of a spirited colt in the

field (G. III, 75: R.R. II, 7, 6); the training of a colt, "rattling

bridles" in the stable (G. III, 184: R.R. II, 7, 12).

Supply bedding for the sheep (G. III, 298: R.R. II, 2, 8), the goat

stable should face southeast (G. III, 302: R.R. II, 3, 6). Goats'

hair used for military purposes (G. III, 313: R.R. II, 11, 11.) Goats

affect rough pasture (G. III, 314: R.R. II, 3, 6). A shepherd's daily

routine (G. III, 322; R.R. II, 2, 10-11). The life of shepherds in the

saltus (G. III, 340: R.R. II, 10, 6). Beware of a ram with a spotted

tongue (G. III, 387: R.R. II, 2, 4). Anoint sheep as a precaution

against scab (G. III, 448: R.R. II, 11, 7).

The location of the bee-stand: a drinking pool with stones in it (G.

IV, 26: R.R. III, 16, 27); planted round with bee plants (G. IV, 25:

R.R. III, 16, 13), and free from an echo (G. IV, 50: R.R. III, 16,

12). When saving a swarm sprinkle bees balm and beat cymbals (G. IV,

62: R.R. III, 16, 7 and 30). Bees at war obey their leaders 'as at

the sound of a trumpet,' but may be quelled by the bee-keeper (G. IV,

70-87: R.R. III, 16, 9 and 35). Keep the mottled king and destroy the

black one (G. IV, 90: R.R. III, 16, 18); the "old Corycian" and the

brothers Veiani (G. IV, 125: R.R. III, 16, 10): the bees' care of

their king (G. IV, 212: R.R. III, 16, 8). Take off the honey twice in

the season (G. IV, 221: R.R. III, 16, 34); the generation of bees from

the carcase of an ox (G. IV, 281: R.R. II, 5, 5) and cf. the wisdom on

this subject attributed to Varro by the _Geoponica_ (XV, 2).

CATO'S DE AGRICULTURA

_Introduction: of the dignity of the farmer_

The pursuits of commerce would be as admirable as they are profitable

if they were not subject to so great risks: and so, likewise, of

banking, if it was always honestly conducted. For our ancestors

considered, and so ordained in their laws, that, while the thief

should be cast in double damages, the usurer should make four-fold

restitution. From this we may judge how much less desirable a citizen

they esteemed the banker than the thief. When they sought to commend

an honest man, they termed him good husbandman, good farmer. This they

rated the superlative of praise.[9] Personally, I think highly of a

man actively and diligently engaged in commerce, who seeks thereby to

make his fortune, yet, as I have said, his career is full of risks and

pitfalls. But it is from the tillers of the soil that spring the best

citizens, the stanchest soldiers; and theirs are the enduring rewards

which are most grateful and least envied. Such as devote themselves to

that pursuit are least of all men given to evil counsels.

And now, to get to my subject, these observations will serve as

preface to what I have promised to discuss.

_Of buying a farm_

(I)[10] When you have decided to purchase a farm, be careful not to buy

rashly; do not spare your visits and be not content with a single tour

of inspection. The more you go, the more will the place please you,

if it be worth your attention. Give heed to the appearance of the

neighbourhood,--a flourishing country should show its prosperity.

"When you go in, look about, so that, when needs be, you can find your

way out."

Take care that you choose a good climate, not subject to destructive

storms, and a soil that is naturally strong. If possible, your farm

should be at the foot of a mountain, looking to the South, in a

healthy situation, where labour and cattle can be had, well watered,

near a good sized town, and either on the sea or a navigable river, or

else on a good and much frequented road. Choose a place which has

not often changed ownership, one which is sold unwillingly, that has

buildings in good repair.

Beware that you do not rashly contemn the experience of others. It

is better to buy from a man who has farmed successfully and built

well.[11]

When you inspect the farm, look to see how many wine presses and

storage vats there are; where there are none of these you can judge

what the harvest is. On the other hand, it is not the number of

farming implements, but what is done with them, that counts. Where you

find few tools, it is not an expensive farm to operate. Know that with

a farm, as with a man, however productive it may be, if it has the

spending habit, not much will be left over.[12]

_Of the duties of the owner._

(II) When you have arrived at your country house and have saluted your

household, you should make the rounds of the farm the same day, if

possible; if not, then certainly the next day. When you have observed

how the field work has progressed,[13] what things have been done, and

what remains undone, you should summon your overseer the next day, and

should call for a report of what work has been done in good season and

why it has not been possible to complete the rest, and what wine and

corn and other crops have been gathered. When you are advised on these

points you should make your own calculation of the time necessary

for the work, if there does not appear to you to have been enough

accomplished. The overseer will report that he himself has worked

diligently, but that some slaves have been sick and others truant,

the weather has been bad, and that it has been necessary to work the

public roads. When he has given these and many other excuses, you

should recall to his attention the program of work which you had

laid out for him on your last visit and compare it with the results

attained. If the weather has been bad, count how many stormy days

there have been, and rehearse what work could have been done despite

the rain, such as washing and pitching the wine vats, cleaning out

the barns, sorting the grain, hauling out and composting the manure,

cleaning seed, mending the old gear, and making new, mending the

smocks and hoods furnished for the hands. On feast days the old

ditches should be mended, the public roads worked, briers cut down,

the garden dug, the meadow cleaned, the hedges trimmed and the

clippings collected and burned, the fish pond cleaned out. On such

days, furthermore, the slaves' rations should be cut down as compared

with what is allowed when they are working in the fields in fine

weather.

When this routine has been discussed quietly and with good humour and

is thoroughly understood by the overseer, you should give orders for

the completion of the work which has been neglected.

The accounts of money, supplies and provisions should then be

considered. The overseer should report what wine and oil has been

sold, what price he got, what is on hand, and what remains for sale.

Security should be taken for such accounts as ought to be secured. All

other unsettled matters should be agreed upon. If any thing is needed

for the coming year, it should be bought; every thing which is not

needed should be sold. Whatever there is for lease should be leased.

Orders should be given (and take care that they are in writing) for

all work which next it is desired to have done on the farm or let to

contract. You should go over the cattle and determine what is to be

sold. You should sell the oil, if you can get your price, the surplus

wine and corn, the old cattle, the worn out oxen, and the cull sheep,

the wool and the hides, the old and sick slaves, and if any thing else

is superfluous you should sell that. The appetite of the good farmer

is to sell, not to buy.[14]

(IV) Be a good neighbour. Do not roughly give offence to your own

people. If the neighbourhood regards you kindly, you will find a

readier market for what you have to sell, you will more easily get

your work done, either on the place or by contract. If you build, your

neighbours will aid you with their services, their cattle and their

materials. If any misfortune should overtake you (which God forbid!)

they will protect you with kindly interest.[15]

_Of laying out the farm_

(I) If you ask me what is the best disposition to make of your estate,

I would say that should you have bought a farm of one hundred _jugera_

(about 66 acres) all told,[16] in the best situation, it should be

planted as follows: 1° a vineyard, if it promises a good yield, 2° an

irrigated garden, 3° an osier bed, 4° an olive yard, 5° a meadow, 6°

a corn field, 7° a wood lot, 8° a cultivated orchard, and 9° a mast

grove[17].

(III) In his youth, the farmer ought, diligently to plant his land,

but he should ponder before he builds. Planting does not require

reflection, but demands action. It is time enough to build when you

have reached your thirty-sixth year, if you have farmed your land well

meanwhile. When you do build, let your buildings be proportioned to

your estate, and your estate to your buildings[18]. It is fitting that

the farm buildings should be well constructed, that you should have

ample oil cellars and wine vats, and a good supply of casks, so that

you can wait for high prices, something which will redound to your

honour, your profit and your self-respect.

(IV) Build your dwelling house in accordance with your means. If you

build well in a good situation and on a good property, and furnish the

house suitably for country life, you will come there more often and

more willingly[19]. The farm will then be better, fewer mistakes will

be made, and you will get larger crops. The face of the master is good

for the land.[20]

(VI) Plant elm trees along the roads and fence rows, so that you may

have the leaves to feed the sheep and cattle, and the timber will be

available if you need it. If any where there are banks of streams or

wet places, there plant reeds; and surround them with willows that the

osiers may serve to tie the vines.

(VII) It is most convenient to set out the land nearest the house as

an orchard, whence fire wood and faggots may be sold and the supply of

the master obtained. In this enclosure should be planted every thing

fitting to the land and vines should be married to the trees.[21]

(VIII) Near the house lay out also a garden with garland flowers and

vegetables[22] of all kinds, and set it about with myrtle hedges, both

white and black, as well as Delphic and Cyprian laurel.

_Of stocking the farm_

(X) An olive farm of two hundred and forty _jugera_ (160 acres) ought

to be stocked as follows: an overseer, a house keeper, five labourers,

three ox drivers, one swineherd, one ass driver, one shepherd; in all

thirteen hands: three pair of oxen,[23] three asses with pack saddles,

to haul out the manure, one other ass to turn the mill, and one

hundred sheep.[24]

_Of the duties of the overseer._[25]

(V) These are the duties of the overseer: He should maintain

discipline. He should observe the feast days. He should respect the

rights of others and steadfastly uphold his own. He should settle all

quarrels among the hands; if any one is at fault he should administer

the punishment. He should take care that no one on the place is in

want, or lacks food or drink; in this respect he can afford to

be generous, for he will thus more easily prevent picking and

stealing.[26]

Unless the overseer is of evil mind, he will himself do no wrong, but

if he permits wrong-doing by others, the master should not suffer

such indulgence to pass with impunity. He should show appreciation of

courtesy, to encourage others to practise it. He should not be given

to gadding or conviviality, but should be always sober. He should

keep the hands busy, and should see that they do what the master has

ordered. He should not think that he knows more than his master. The

friends of the master should be his friends, and he should give heed

to those whom the master has recommended to him. He should confine his

religious practices to church on Sunday, or to his own house.[27]

He should lend money to no man unbidden by the master, but what the

master has lent he should collect. He should never lend any seed

reserved for sowing, feed, corn, wine, or oil, but he should have

relations with two or three other farms with which he can exchange

things needed in emergency. He should state his accounts with his

master frequently. He should not keep any hired men or day hands

longer than is necessary. He should not sell any thing without the

knowledge of the master, nor should he conceal any thing from the

master. He should not have any hangers-on, nor should he consult any

soothsayer, fortune teller, necromancer, or astrologer. He should not

spare seed in sowing, for that is bad economy. He should strive to be

expert in all kinds of farm work, and, without exhausting himself,

often lend a hand. By so doing, he will better understand the point of

view of his hands, and they will work more contentedly; moreover, he

will have less inclination to gad, his health will be better, and he

will sleep more refreshingly.

First up in the morning, he should be the last to go to bed at night;

and before he does, he should see that the farm gates are closed, and

that each of the hands is in his own bed, that the stock have been

fed. He should see that the best of care is taken of the oxen, and

should pay the highest compliments to the teamsters who keep their

cattle in the best condition. He should see to it that the ploughs

and plough shares are kept in good repair. Plan all the work in ample

time, for so it is with farm work, if one thing is done late, every

thing will be late.

(XXXIX) When it rains try to find some thing to do indoors. Clean up,

rather than remain idle. Remember that while work may stop, expenses

still go on.

_Of the duties of the housekeeper_

(CXLIII) The overseer should be responsible for the duties of the

housekeeper. If the master has given her to you for a wife, you should

be satisfied with her, and she should respect you. Require that she

be not given to wasteful habits; that she does not gossip with the

neighbours and other women. She should not receive visitors either in

the kitchen or in her own quarters. She should not go out to parties,

nor should she gad about.[28] She should not practise religious

observances, nor should she ask others to do so for her without the

permission of the master or the mistress. Remember that the master

practises religion for the entire household. She should be neat in

appearance and should keep the house swept and garnished. Every night

before she goes to bed she should see that the hearth is swept and

clean. On the Kalends, the Ides, the Nones, and on all feast days, she

should hang a garland over the hearth. On those days also she should

pray fervently to the household gods. She should take care that she

has food cooked for you and for the hands. She should have plenty of

chickens and an abundance of eggs.[29] She should diligently put up all

kinds of preserves every year.

_Of the hands_

(LVI) The following are the customary allowances for food: For the

hands, four pecks of meal for the winter, and four and one-half for

the summer. For the overseer, the housekeeper, the wagoner, the

shepherd, three pecks each. For the slaves, four pounds of bread

for the winter, but when they begin to cultivate the vines this is

increased to five pounds until the figs are ripe, then return to four

pounds.

(LVII) The sum of the wine allowed for each hand per annum is eight

quadrantals, or Amphora, but add in the proportion as they do work.

Ten quadrantals per annum is not too much to allow them to drink.

(LVIII) Save the wind fall olives as much as possible as relishes for

the hands. Later set aside such of the ripe olives as will make the

least oil. Be careful to make them go as far as possible. When the

olives are all eaten, give them fish pickles and vinegar. One peck of

salt per annum is enough for each hand.

(LIX) Allow each hand a smock and a cloak every other year. As often

as you give out a smock or cloak to any one take up the old one, so

that caps can be made out of it. A pair of heavy wooden shoes should

be allowed every other year.

_Of draining_

(XLIII) If the land is wet, it should be drained with trough shaped

ditches dug three feet wide at the surface and one foot at the bottom

and four feet deep. Blind these ditches with rock. If you have no rock

then fill them with green willow poles braced crosswise. If you have

no poles, fill then with faggots. Then dig lateral trenches three feet

deep and four feet wide in such way that the water will flow from the

trenches into the ditches.

(CLV) In the winter surface water should be drained off the fields.

On hillsides courses should be kept clear for the water to flow off.

During the rainy season at the beginning of Autumn is the greatest

risk from water. When it begins to rain all the hands should go out

with picks and shovels and clear out the drains so that the water may

flow off into the roads, and the crops be protected.

_Of preparing the seed bed_

(LXI) What is the first principle of good agriculture? To plough well.

What is the second? To plough again; and the third is to manure. When

you plough corn land, plough well and in good weather, lest you turn

a cloddy furrow. The other things of good agriculture are to sow seed

plentifully, to thin the young sprouts, and to hill up the roots with

earth.

(V) Never plough rotten land[30] nor drive flocks or carts across it.

If care is not taken about this, the land so abused will be barren for

three years.

_Of manure_

(V) Plan to have a big compost heap and take the best of care of the

manure. When it is hauled out see that it is well rotted and spread.

The Autumn is the time to do this.

(XXXVII) You can make manure of litter, lupine straw, chaff, bean

stalks, husks and the leaves of ilex and of oak.[31]

(XXX) Fold your sheep on the land which you are about to seed, and

there feed them leaves.[32]

_Of soil improvement_

(XXXVII) The things which are harmful to corn land are to plough the

ground when it is rotten, and to plant chick peas which are harvested

with the straw and are salt. Barley, fenugreek and pulse all exhaust

corn land, as well as all other things which are harvested with the

straw. Do not plant nut trees in the corn land. On the other hand,

lupines, field beans and vetch manure corn land.[33]

(VI) Where the soil is rich and fertile, without shade, there the corn

land ought to be. Where the land lies low, plant rape, millet, and

panic grass.

_Of forage crops_

(VIII) If you have a water meadow you will not want forage, but if not

then sow an upland meadow, so that hay may not be lacking.

(LIII) Save your hay when the times comes, and beware lest you mow too

late. Mow before the seed is ripe. House the best hay by itself, so

that you may feed it to the draft cattle during the spring ploughing,

before the clover is mature.

(XXVII) Sow, for feed for the cattle, clover, vetch, fenugreek, field

beans and pulse. Sow these crops a second and a third time.

_Of planting_

(XXXIV) Wherever the land is cold and wet, sow there first, and last

of all in the warmest places.

_Of pastures_

(L) Manure the pastures in early spring in the dark of the moon, when

the west wind begins to blow. When you close your pastures (to the

stock) clean them and root out all weeds.

_Of feeding live stock_

(XXX) As long as they are available, feed green leaves of elm, poplar,

oak and fig to your cattle and sheep.

(V) Store leaves, also, to be fed to the sheep before they have

withered.[34]

(XXX) Take the best of care of your dry fodder, which you house for

the winter, and remember always how long the winter may last.

(IV) Be sure you have well constructed stables furnished with

substantial stalls and equipped with latticed feed racks. The

intervals between the bars of the racks should be one foot. If you

build them in this way, the cattle will not waste their food.

(LIV) This is the way that provender should be prepared and fed: When

the seeding is finished, gather mast and soak it in water. Feed a

measure of it every day to each steer; or if they have not been worked

it will be sufficient to let them pasture the mast beds. Another good

feed is a measure of grape husks which you shall have preserved in

jars. By day turn the cattle out and at night feed twenty-five pounds

of hay to each steer. If hay is short, feed the leaves of the ilex and

ivy.[35] Stack the straw of wheat, barley, beans, vetch and lupine,

indeed all the grain straws, but pick out and house the best of it.

Scatter your straw with salt and you can then feed it in place of hay.

When in the spring you begin to feed (more heavily to prepare for

work), feed a measure of mast or of grape husks, or a measure of

ground lupines, and fifteen pounds of hay. When the clover is ripe,

feed that first. Gather it by hand so that it will bloom a second

time, for what you harvest with the sickle blooms no more. Feed clover

until it is dry, then feed vetch and then panic grass, and after the

panic grass feed elm leaves. If you have poplar, mix that with the elm

so that the elm may last the longer. If you have no elm feed oak and

fig leaves.

Nothing is more profitable than to take good care of your cattle.

Cattle should not be put out to graze except in winter when they are

not worked; for when they eat green stuff they expect it all the time,

and it is then necessary to muzzle them while they plough.

_Of the care of live stock_

(V) The flocks and herds should be well supplied with litter and their

feet kept clean. If litter is short, haul in oak leaves, they will

serve as bedding for sheep and cattle. Beware of scab among the sheep

and cattle. This comes from hunger and exposure to rain.

(LXXII) To prevent the oxen from wearing down their hoofs, anoint

the bottom of the hoof with liquid pepper before driving them on the

highroad.

(LXXIII) Take care that during the summer the cattle drink only sweet

and fresh water. Their health depends on it.

(XCVI) To prevent scab among sheep, make a mixture of equal parts of

well strained amurca,[36] of water in which lupine has been steeped,

and of lees of good wine. After shearing, anoint all the flock with

this mixture, and let them sweat profusely for two or three days. Then

dip them in the sea. If you have no sea water, make salt water and dip

then in that. If you will do this they will suffer no scab, they will

have more and better wool and they will not be molested by ticks.

(LXXI) If an ox begins to sicken, give him without delay a raw hen's

egg and make him swallow it whole. The next day make him drink from a

wooden bowl a measure of wine in which has been scraped the head of an

onion. Both the ox and his attendant should do these things fasting

and standing upright.

(CII) If a serpent shall bite an ox, or any other quadruped, take a

cup of that extract of fennel, which the physicians call smyrnean, and

mix it with a measure of old wine. Inject this through his nostrils

and at the same time poultice the wound with hogs' dung.[37] You can

treat a man the same way.

(CLX) If a bone is dislocated it can be made sound by this

incantation. Take a green reed four or five feet long, split it down

the middle and let two men hold the pieces against your hips. Begin

then to chant as follows:

"In Alio. S.F. Motas Vaeta,

Daries Dardaries Astataries Dissunapiter"

and continue until the free ends of the reed are brought slowly

together in front of you. Meanwhile, wave a knife above the reeds, and

when they come together and one touches the other, seize them in your

hand and cut them right and left. These pieces of reed bound upon a

dislocated or fractured bone will cure it.[38]

But every day repeat the incantation, or in place of it this one:

"Huat Hanat Huat

Ista Pista Sista

Domiabo Damnaustra"[39]

_Of cakes and salad_[40]

(LXXV) This is the recipe for cheese cake (_libum_): Bray well two

pounds of cheese in a mortar, and, when this is done, pour in a pound

of corn meal (or, if you want to be more dainty, a half pound of

flour) and mix it thoroughly with the cheese. Add one egg and beat it

well. Pat into a cake, place it on leaves and bake slowly on a hot

hearth stone under a dish.

(CXIX) This is the recipe for olive salad (_epityrum_): Select some

white, black and mottled olives and stone them. Mix and cut them up.

Add a dressing of oil, vinegar, coriander, cumin, fennel, rue and

mint. Mix well in an earthen ware dish, and serve with oil.

(CXXI) This is the recipe for must cake (_mustaceus_): Sprinkle a peck

of wheat flour with must. Add anise, cumin, two pounds of lard, a

pound of cheese and shredded laurel twigs. When you have kneaded the

dough, put laurel leaves under it and so bake.

_Of curing hams_

(CLXII) This is the way to cure hams in jars or tubs: When you have

bought your hams trim off the hocks. Take a half peck (_semodius_) of

ground Roman salt for each ham. Cover the bottom of the jar or tub

with salt and put in a ham, skin down. Cover the whole with salt and

put another ham on top, and cover this in the same manner. Be careful

that meat does not touch meat. So proceed, and when you have packed

all the hams, cover the top with salt so that no meat can be seen, and

smooth it out even. When the hams have been in salt five days, take

them all out with the salt and repack them, putting those which were

on top at the bottom. Cover them in the same way with salt and press

them down.

After the twelfth day remove the hams finally, brush off the salt and

hang them for two days in the wind. On the third day wipe them off

clean with a sponge and rub them with (olive) oil. Then hang them in

smoke for two days, and on the third day rub them with a mixture of

(olive) oil and vinegar.

Then hang them in the meat house, and neither bats nor worms will

touch them.[41]

VARRO'S RERUM RUSTICARUM

LIBRI TRES

BOOK I

THE HUSBANDRY OF AGRICULTURE

_Introduction: the literary tradition of country life_

I

Had I leisure, Fundania, this book would be more worthy of you, but I

write as best I may, conscious always of the necessity of haste: for,

if, as the saying is, all life is but a bubble, the more fragile is

that of an old man, and my eightieth year admonishes me to pack my

fardel and prepare for the long journey.

You have bought a farm and wish to increase its fertility by good

cultivation, and you ask me what I would do with it were it mine. Not

only while I am still alive will I try to advise you in this, but I

will make my counsel available to you after I am dead. For as it befel

the Sibyl to have been of service to mankind not alone while she

lived, but even to the uttermost generations of men after her demise

(for we are wont after so many years still to have solemn recourse to

her books for guidance in interpretation of strange portents), so

may not I, while I still live, bequeath my counsel to my nearest and

dearest.[42] I will then write three books for you, to which you may

have recourse for guidance in all things which must be done in the

management of a farm.

And since, as men say, the gods aid those who propitiate them, I will

begin my book by invoking divine approval, not like Homer and Ennius,

from the Muses, nor indeed from the twelve great gods of the city

whose golden images stand in the forum, six male and as many female,

but from a solemn council of those twelve divinities who are the

tutelaries of husbandmen.

* * * * *

First: I call upon Father Jupiter and Mother Earth, who fecundate all

the processes of agriculture in the air and in the soil, and hence are

called the great parents.

_Second_: I invoke the Sun and the Moon by whom the seasons for sowing

and reaping are measured.

_Third_: I invoke Ceres and Bacchus because the fruits they mature

are most necessary to life, and by their aid the land yields food and

drink.

_Fourth_: I invoke Robigus and Flora by whose influence the blight is

kept from crop and tree, and in due season they bear fruit (for which

reason is the annual festival of the _robigalia_ celebrated in honour

of Robigus, and that of the _floralia_ in honour of Flora).[43]

_Next_: I supplicate Minerva, who protects the olive; and Venus,

goddess of the garden, wherefore is she worshipped at the rural wine

festivals.

_And last_: I adjure Lympha, goddess of the fountains, and Bonus

Eventus, god of good fortune, since without water all vegetation is

starved and stunted and without due order and good luck all tillage is

in vain.

* * * * *

And so having paid my duty to the gods, I proceed to rehearse some

conversations[44] concerning agriculture in which I have recently taken

part. From them you will derive all the practical instruction you

require, but in case any thing is lacking and you wish further

authority, I refer you to the treatises of the Greeks and of our own

countrymen.

The Greek writers who have treated incidentally of agriculture are

more than fifty in number. Those whom you may consult with profit

are Hieron of Sicily and Attalus Philometor, among the philosophers;

Democritus the physicist; Xenophon the disciple of Socrates; Aristotle

and Theophrastus, the peripatetics; Archytas the pythagorean; likewise

the Athenian Amphilochus, Anaxipolis of Thasos, Apollodorus of Lemnos,

Aristophanes of Mallos, Antigonus of Cyme, Agathocles of Chios,

Apollonius of Pergamum, Aristandrus of Athens, Bacchius of Miletus,

Bion of Soli, Chaeresteus and Chaereas of Athens, Diodorus of Priene,

Dion of Colophon, Diophanes of Nicaea, Epigenes of Rhodes, Evagon

of Thasos, Euphronius of Athens, and his name sake of Amphipolis,

Hegesias of Maronea, the two Menanders, one of Priene, the other of

Heraclaea, Nicesius of Maronea, Pythion of Rhodes. Among the rest

whose countries I do not know, are Andiotion, Aeschrion, Aristomenes,

Athenagoras, Crates, Dadis, Dionysius, Euphiton, Euphorion, Eubulus,

Lysimachus, Mnaseas, Menestratus, Plentiphanes, Persis, and

Theophilus.

All those whom I have named wrote in prose, but there are those also

who have written in verse, as Hesiod of Ascra and Menecrates of

Ephesus.

The agricultural writer of the greatest reputation is, however, Mago

the Carthaginian[45] who wrote in the Punic tongue and collected in

twenty-eight books all the wisdom which before him had been scattered

in many works. Cassius Dionysius of Utica translated Mago into Greek

in twenty books (and dedicated his work to the praetor Sextilius), and

notwithstanding that he reduced Mago by eight books he cited freely

from the Greek authors whom I have named. Diophanes made a useful

digest of Cassius in six books, which he dedicated to Deiotarus, King

of Bithynia. I have ventured to compress the subject into the still

smaller compass of three books, the first on the husbandry of

agriculture, the second on the husbandry of live stock and the third

on the husbandry of the steading.

From the first book I have excluded all those things which I do not

deem to relate immediately to agriculture: thus having first limited

my subject I proceed to discuss it, following its natural divisions.

My information has been derived from three sources, my own experience,

my reading, and what I have heard from others.

_Of the definition of agriculture_

_a. What it is not_

II. On the holiday which we call Sementivae I came to the temple

of Tellus at the invitation of the Sacristan (I was taught by my

ancestors to call him _Aeditumus_ but the modern purist tells me

I must say _Aedituus_). There I found assembled C. Fundanius, my

father-in-law, C. Agrius, a Roman Knight and a disciple of the

Socratic school, and P. Agrasius, of the Revenue service: they were

gazing on a map of Italy painted on the wall. "What are you doing

here?" said I. "Has the festival of the seed-sowing drawn you hither

to spend your holiday after the manner of our ancestors, by praying

for good crops?" "We are here," said Agrius, "for the same reason that

you are, I imagine--because the Sacristan has invited us to dinner. If

this be true, as your nod admits, wait with us until he returns, for

he was summoned by his chief, the aedile, and has not yet returned

though he left word for us to wait for him."

"Until he comes then," said I, "let us make a practical application of

the ancient proverb that 'The Roman conquers by sitting down.'"

"You're right," cried Agrius, and, remembering that the first step of

a journey is the most difficult,[46] he lead the way to the benches

forthwith and we followed. When we were seated Agrasius spoke up.

"You who have travelled over many lands," said he, "have you seen any

country better cultivated than Italy?"

"I, for one, don't believe," replied Agrius, "that there is any

country which is so intensely cultivated. By a very natural division

Eratosthenes has divided the earth into two parts, that facing South

and that facing North: and as without doubt the North is healthier

than the South, so it is more fertile, for a healthy country is always

the most fertile. It must be admitted then that the North is fitter

for cultivation than Asia, and particularly is this true of Italy;

first, because Italy is in Europe, and, second, because this part of

Europe has a more temperate climate than the interior. For almost

everlasting winter grips the lands to the North of us. Nor is this to

be wondered at since there are regions within the Arctic Circle and at

the pole where the sun is not seen for six months at a time. Yea, it

is even said that it is not possible to sail a ship in those parts

because the very sea is frozen over."

"Would you think it possible," said Fundanius, "for any thing to grow

in such a region, and, if it did grow, how could it be cultivated? The

tragedian Pacuvius has spoken sooth where he says:

'Should sun or night maintain e'er lasting reign,

Then all the grateful fruits of earth must die,

Nipped by the cold, or blasted by the heat.'

Even here in this pleasant region, where night and day revolve

punctually, I am not able to live in summer unless I divide the day

with my appointed midday nap. How is it possible to plant or to

cultivate or to harvest any thing there where the days and nights are

six months long. On the other hand, what useful thing is there which

does not only grow but flourish in Italy? What spelt shall I compare

with that of Campania? What wheat with that of Apulia? What wine with

that of Falernum? What oil with that of Venafrum? Is not Italy so

covered with fruit trees that it seems one vast orchard? Is Phrygia,

which Homer calls [Greek: ampeloessa], more teeming with vines, or

is Argos, which the same poet calls [Greek: polupuros] more rich in

corn?[47] In what land does one jugerum produce ten, nay even fifteen,

cullei of wine, as in some regions of Italy? Has not M. Cato written

in his book of _Origines_ 'That region lying this side of Ariminium

and beyond Picenum, which was allotted to colonists, is called Roman

Gaul. There in several places a single jugerum of land produces ten

cullei of wine.' Is it not the same in the region of Faventia where

the vines are called _tre centaria_ because a jugerum yields three

hundred amphorae of wine," and, looking at me, he added, "indeed L.

Martius, your chief engineer, said that the vines on his Faventine

farm yielded that much.[48] The Italian farmer looks chiefly for

two things in considering a farm, whether it will yield a harvest

proportioned to the capital and labour he must invest, and whether the

location is healthy. Whoever neglects either of these considerations

and despite them proposes to carry on a farm, is a fool and should be

taken in charge by a committee of his relatives.[49] For no sane man is

willing to spend on an agricultural operation time and money which he

knows he cannot recoup, nor even if he sees a likely profit, if it

must be at the risk of losing all by an evil climate.

"But there are here present those who can discourse on this subject

with more authority than I, for I see C. Licinius Stolo and Cn.

Tremelius Scrofa approaching. It was the ancestor of the first of

these who brought in the law for the regulation of land-holding; for

the law which forbade a Roman citizen to own more than 500 jugera of

land was proposed by that Licinius who acquired the cognomen of Stolo

on account of his diligence in cultivating his land: he is said to

have dug around his trees so thoroughly that there could not be found

on his farm a single one of those suckers which spring up from the

ground at the roots of trees and are called _stolones_. Of the same

family was that other C. Licinius who, when he was tribune of the

people, 365 years after the expulsion of the Kings, first transferred

the Sovereign function of law making from the Comitium to the Forum,

thus as it were constituting that area the 'farm' of the entire

people.[50] The other whom I see come hither is Cn. Tremelius Scrofa,

your colleague on the Committee of Twenty for the division of the

Campanian lands, a man distinguished by all the virtues and considered

to be the Roman most expert in agriculture.[51]

"And justly so," I exclaimed, "for his farms are a more pleasing

spectacle to many on account of their clean cultivation than the

stately palaces of others;[52] when one goes to visit his country

place, one sees granaries and not picture galleries, as at the 'farm'

of Lucullus.[53] Indeed," I added, "the apple market at the head of the

Sacred Way is the very image of Scrofa's fruit house."

As the new comers joined us, Stolo inquired: "Have we arrived after

dinner is over, for we do not see L. Fundilius who invited us."

"Be of good cheer," replied Agrius, "for not only has that egg which

indicates the last lap of the chariot race in the games at the circus

not yet been removed, but we have not even seen that other egg which

is the first course of dinner.[54] And so until the Sacristan returns

and joins us do you discourse to us of the uses or the pleasures of

agriculture, or of both. For now the sceptre of agriculture is in your

hands, which formerly, they say, belonged to Stolo."

"First of all," began Scrofa, "we must have a definition. Are we to be

limited in discussing agriculture to the planting of the land or are

we to touch also on those other occupations which are carried on in

the country, such as feeding sheep and cattle. For I have observed

that those who write on agriculture, whether in Greek or Punic or

Latin, wander widely from their subject."

"I do not think that those authors should be imitated in that," said

Stolo, "for I deem them to have done better who have confined the

subject to the straitest limits, excluding all considerations which

are not strictly pertinent to the subject. Wherefore the subject of

grazing, which many writers treat as a part of agriculture, seems to

me to belong rather to a treatise on live stock. That the occupations

are different is apparent from the difference in the names of those we

put in charge of them, for we call one the farmer (_villicus_) and the

other the herdsman (_magister pecoris_). The farmer is charged with

the cultivation of the land and is so called from the _villa_ or farm

house to which he hauls in the crops from the fields and from which he

hauls them away when they are sold. Wherefore also the peasants say

_vea_ for _via_, deriving their word for the road over which they haul

from the name of the vehicle in which they do the hauling, _vectura_,

and by the same derivation _vella_ for _villa_, the farm house to and

from which they haul. In like manner the trade of a carrier is called

_vellatura_ from the practice of driving a _vectura_, or cart."

"Surely," said Fundanius, "feeding cattle is one thing and agriculture

is another, but they are related. Just as the right pipe of the

_tibia_ is different from the left pipe, yet are they complements

because while the one leads, it is to carry the air, and the other

follows, it is for the accompaniment."

"And, to push your analogy further, it may be added," said I, "that

the pastoral life, like the _tibia dextra_, has led and given the cue

to the agricultural life, as we have on the authority of that learned

man Dicaearchus who, in his _Life of Greece_ from the earliest times,

shows us how in the beginning men pursued a purely pastoral life and

knew not how to plough nor to plant trees nor to prune them; only

later taking up the pursuits of agriculture; whence it may be

said that agriculture is in harmony with the pastoral life but is

subordinate to it, as the left pipe is to the right pipe."

"Beware," exclaimed Agrius, "of pushing your musical analogy too far,

for you would not only rob the farmer of his cattle and the shepherd

of his livelihood but you would even break the law of the land in

which it is written that a farmer may not graze a young orchard with

that pestiferous animal which astrology has placed in the heavens near

the Bull."

"See here, Agrius," said Fundanius, "let there be no mistake about

this. The law you cite applies only to certain designated kinds of

cattle, as indeed there are kinds of cattle which are the foes and the

bane of agriculture such as those you have mentioned--the goats--for

by their nibbling they ruin young plantations, and not the least vines

and olives. But, because the goat is the greatest offender in this

respect, we have a rule for him which works both ways, namely: that

victims of his family are grateful offerings on the altar of one god

but should never come near the fane of another; since by reason of the

same hate one god is not willing even to see a goat and the other is

pleased to see him killed. So it is that goats found among the vines

are sacrificed to Father Bacchus as it were that they should pay the

penalty of their evil doing with their lives; while on the contrary

nothing of the goat kind is ever sacrificed to Minerva, because they

are said to make the olive sterile even by licking it, for their very

spittle is poison to the fruit. For this reason goats are never

driven into the Acropolis of Athens, except once a year for a certain

necessary sacrifice, lest the olive tree, which is said to have its

origin there,[55] might be touched by a goat."

"No kind of cattle," said I, "are of any use to agriculture except

those which aid in the cultivation of the land, as they do when they

are yoked to the plough."

"If this was so," said Agrasius, "how could we afford to take cattle

off the land, since it is from our flocks and herds that we derive the

manure which is of the greatest benefit to our purely agricultural

operations."

"On your argument of convenience," said Agrius, "we might claim that

slave dealing was a branch of agriculture, if they were agricultural

slaves which we dealt in. The error lies in the assumption that

because cattle are good for the land, they make crops grow on the

land. It does not follow, for by that reasoning other things would

become part of agriculture which have nothing to do with it: as for

example spinsters and weavers and other craftsmen which you might keep

on your farm."

"Let us then agree," said Scrofa, "to exclude live stock from our

consideration of the art of agriculture. Does any one want to exclude

any thing else?"

"Are we to follow the book of the two Sasernas," I inquired, "and

discuss whether the manufacture of pottery is more related to

agriculture than mining for silver or other metals? Doubtless the

material comes out of the ground in both cases, but no one claims

that quarrying for stone or washing sand has any thing to do with

agriculture, so why bring in the potter? It is not a question of what

comes out of the land, nor of what can be done profitably on a farm,

for if it were it might as well be argued that had one a farm lying

along a frequented road and a site on it convenient to travellers,

it would be the farmer's business to build a cross-roads tavern. But

surely, however profitable this might prove, it would not make the

speculation any part of agriculture. It is not, I repeat, whether the

business is carried on on account of the land, nor out of the land,

that it may be classed as a part of agriculture, but only if from

planting the land one gains a profit."

"You are jealous of this great writer," interrupted Stolo. "Because of

his unfortunate potteries you rebuke him captiously and give him no

credit for all the admirable things which he says about matters which

certainly relate to agriculture."

At this sally, Scrofa, who knew the book and justly contemned it,

smiled, whereupon Agrasius, who thought that he and Stolo alone knew

the book demanded of Scrofa a quotation from it.

"Here is his recipe for getting rid of bugs," said Scrofa. "'Steep a

wild cucumber in water and where-ever you sprinkle it the bugs will

disappear,' and again, 'Grease your bed with ox gall mixed with

vinegar.'"

Fundanius looked at Scrofa. "And yet Saserna gives good advice even if

it is in a book on agriculture," he said.

"Yes, by Hercules," said Scrofa, "and especially in his recipe for

removing superfluous hair, in which he bids you take a yellow frog and

stew it down to a third of its size and then rub the body with what is

left."[56]

"I would rather cite," said I, "Sasernas' prescription for the malady

from which Fundanius suffers, for his corns make wrinkles on his

brow."

"Tell me, pray, quickly," exclaimed Fundanius, "for I had rather learn

how to root out my corns than how to plant beet roots."

"I will tell you," said Stolo, "in the very words he wrote it, or at

least as I heard Tarquenna read it: 'When a man's feet begin to hurt

he should think of you to enable you to cure him.'"

"I am thinking of you," said Fundanius, "now cure my feet."

"Listen to the incantation," said Stolo.

'May the earth keep the malady,

May good health remain here.'

Saserna bids you chant this formula thrice nine times, to touch the

earth, to spit and be sure that you do it all before breakfast."

"You will find," said I, "many other wonderful secrets in Saserna, all

equally foreign to agriculture, and so all to be left where they are.

But it must be admitted that such digressions are found in many other

authors. Does not the agricultural treatise of the great Cato himself

fairly bristle with them, as for instance his instructions how to make

must cake and cheese cake, and how to cure hams?"

"You forget," said Agrius, "his most important precept: 'If you wish

to drink freely and dine well in company, you should eat five leaves

of raw cabbage steeped in vinegar, before sitting down to the table.'"

_b. What agriculture is_

III. "And so," said Agrasius, "as we have agreed upon and eliminated

from the discussion all those things which agriculture is not, it

remains to discuss what it is. Is it an art, and, if so, what are its

principles and its purposes?"

Stolo turned to Scrofa and said: "You are our senior in age, in

reputation and in experience, you should speak." And Scrofa, nothing

loath, began as follows:

"In the first place, agriculture is not only an art but an art which

is as useful as it is important. It is furthermore a science, which

teaches how every kind of land should be planted and cultivated, and

how to know what kind of land will produce the largest crops for the

longest time.[57]"

_The purposes of agriculture are profit and pleasure_

IV. The elements with which this science deals are the same as those

which Ennius says are the elements of the universe--water, earth,

air and fire. Before sowing your seed it behooves you to study these

elements because they are the origin of all growing things. So

prepared, the farmer should direct his efforts to two ends: profit and

pleasure,[58] one solid the other agreeable: but he should give the

preference to the pursuit of profit.[59] And yet those who have regard

for appearances in their farming, as for instance by planting their

orchards and olive yards in orderly array, often add not only to the

productiveness of the farm but as well to its saleability, and so

doubly increase the value of their estate. For of two things of equal

usefulness, who would not prefer to buy the better looking?

The farm which is healthiest is the most valuable, for there the

profit is certain. On the other hand, on an unhealthy farm, however

fertile it may be, misfortune dogs the steps of the farmer. For where

the struggle is against Death, there not only is the profit uncertain,

but one's very existence is constantly at risk: and so agriculture

becomes a gamble in which the farmer hazards both his life and his

fortune. And yet this risk can be diminished by forethought, for, when

health depends upon climate, we can do much to control nature and by

diligence improve evil conditions. If the farm is unhealthy by reason

of the plight of the land itself, or of the water supply, or is

exposed to the miasma which breeds in some localities, or if the farm

is too hot on account of the climate, or is exposed to mischievous

winds, these discomforts can be mitigated by one who knows what to do

and is willing to spend some money. What is of the greatest importance

in this respect is the situation of the farm buildings, their plan

and convenience, and what is the aspect of their doors and gates and

windows. During the great plague, Hippocrates the physician saved not

merely one farm but many cities because he knew this. But why should

I summon him as a witness: for when the army and the fleet lay at

Corcyra[60] and all the houses were crowded with the sick and dying,

did not our Varro here contrive to open new windows to the healthy

North wind and close those which gave entrance to the infected breezes

of the South, to change doors and to do other such things, and so

succeed in restoring his comrades safe and sound to their native land?

_The fourfold division of the study of agriculture_

V. I have rehearsed the elements and the purposes of agriculture, it

now remains to consider in how many divisions this science is to be

studied."

"I have supposed these to be without number," said Agrius, "when I

have read the many books which Theophrastus wrote on _The History of

Plants_ and _The Causes of Vegetation_.

"These books," said Stolo, "have always seemed to me to be fitter

for use in the schools of the philosophers than in the hands of a

practical farmer. I do not mean to say that they do not contain many

things which are both useful and practical. However that may be, do

you rather explain to us the divisions in which agriculture should be

studied."

"There are four chapters for the study of agriculture, of the highest

practical importance," resumed Scrofa, "namely:"

1° What are the physical characteristics of the land to be cultivated,

including the constitution of the soil;

2° What labour and equipment are necessary for such cultivation;

3° What system of farming is to be practised;

4° What are the season? at which the several farming operations are to

be carried out.

Each of these four chapters may be divided in at least two

subdivisions:

The first into (_a_) a study of the soil, and (_b_) a survey of the

buildings and stabling.

The second into an enquiry as to (_c_), the men who will carry on the

farming operations, and (_d_) the implements they will require.

The third into (_e_) the kind of work to be planned, and (_f_) where

that work is to be done.

The fourth into what relates (_g_) to the annual revolution of the

sun, and (_h_) the monthly revolution of the moon.

I will speak of the four principal parts first, and then in detail of

the eight subdivisions.

1° CONCERNING THE FARM ITSELF

_How conformation of the land affects agriculture_

VI. Four things must be considered in respect of the physical

characteristics of the farm: its conformation, the quality of

the soil, its extent, and whether it is naturally protected. The

conformation is either natural, or artificial as the result of

cultivation, and may be good or bad in either case. I will speak first

of natural conformation, of which there are three kinds: plain, hill

and mountain--although there is a fourth kind made up of a combination

of any two or all three of those mentioned, as may be seen in many

places. A different system of cultivation is required for each of

these three kinds of farms, for without doubt that which is suited for

the hot plain would not suit the windy mountain, while a hill farm

enjoys a more temperate climate than either of the other two kinds and

so demands its own system of cultivation. These distinctions are most

apparent when the several characteristic conformations are of large

extent, as for example the heat and the humidity are greater in a

broad plain, like that of Apulia, while on a mountain like Vesuvius

the climate is usually fresher and so more healthy. Those who

cultivate the lowlands feel the effects of their climate most in

summer, but they are able to do their planting earlier in the spring,

while those who dwell in the mountains suffer most from their climate

in winter, and both sow and reap at later seasons. Frequently the

winter is more propitious to those who dwell in the plains because

then the pastures are fresh there and the trees may be pruned more

readily. On the other hand the summer is more kindly in the mountains

for then the upland grass is rich when the pastures of the plains are

burnt, and it is more comfortable to cultivate the trees in a keen

air.

A lowland farm is best when it is gently sloping rather than

absolutely flat, because on a flat farm water cannot run off and so

forms swampy places. But it is a disadvantage to have the surface too

rolling because that causes the water to collect and form ponds.

Certain trees, like the fir and the pine, flourish most in the

mountains on account of the eager air, while in this region where it

is more temperate the poplars and the willows thrive best. Again the

arbute and the oak prefer the more fertile lands, while the almond and

the fig trees love the lowlands.[61] The growth on the low hills takes

on more of the character of the plains, on the high hills that of the

mountains. For these reasons the kind of crops to be planted must be

suited to the physical characteristics of the farm, as grain for the

plains, vines for the hills and forests for the mountains.

All these considerations should be weighed separately with reference

to each of the three kinds of conformation.

VII. "It seems to me," said Stolo, "that, so far as concerns the

natural situation of a farm, Cato's opinion is just. He wrote, you

will recall, that the best farm was one which lay at the foot of a

mountain looking to the South."

Scrofa resumed: "So far as concerns the laying out of the farm, I

maintain that the more appearances are considered the greater will be

the profit, as, for instance, orchards should be planted in straight

lines arranged in quincunxes and at a reasonable distance apart. It

is a fact that, because of their unintelligent plan of planting, our

ancestors made less wine and corn to the acre than we do. The point is

that if each plant is set with due reference to the others they occupy

less land and are less likely to screen from one another the influence

of the sun and the moon and the air. This may be illustrated by an

experiment: you can press a parcel of nuts with their shells on into a

measure having only two thirds of the capacity of what is required to

contain them after they have been cracked, because the shells keep

them naturally compacted. When trees are planted in rows the sun and

the moon have access to them equally from all sides, with the result

that more raisins and olives are developed and then mature more

quickly, a double result with the double consequence of a larger crop

of must and oil and a greater profit."

_How character of soil affects agriculture_

"We will now take up the second consideration in respect of the

physical characteristics of a farm, namely: the quality of the soil,

which partly, if not entirely, determines whether it is considered a

good or a bad farm: for on this depends what crops can be planted and

harvested and how they should be cultivated, as it is not possible

to plant everything successfully on the same soil. For one soil is

suitable for vines, another for corn, and others for other things. In

the island of Crete, near Cortynia, there is said to be a plane tree

which does not lose its leaves even in winter--a phenomenon due

doubtless to the quality of the soil. There is another of the same

kind in Cyprus, according to Theophrastus. Likewise within sight of

the city of Sybaris (which is now called Thurii) stands an oak having

the same characteristic. Again at Elephantine neither the vines nor

the fig trees lose their leaves, something that never happens with

us. For the same reason many trees bear fruit twice a year, as do

the vines near the sea at Smyrna, and the apples in the fields of

Consentinium. The effect of soil appears also from the fact that those

plants which bear most profusely in wild places produce better fruit

under cultivation. The same explanation applies to those plants which

cannot live except in a marshy place, or indeed in the very water:

they are even nice about the kind of water, some grow in ponds like

the reeds at Reate, others in streams like the alders in Epirus, some

even in the sea like the palms and the squills of which Theophrastus

writes. When I was in the army, I saw in Transalpine Gaul, near the

Rhine, lands where neither the vine, nor the olive, nor the pear tree

grew, where they manured their fields with a white chalk which they

dug out of the ground:[62] where they had no salt, either mineral or

marine, but used in place of it the salty ashes obtained from burning

a certain kind of wood."

Stolo here interrupted. "You will recall," he said, "that Cato in

comparing the different kinds of soil, ranked them by their merit in

nine classes according to what they would produce, of which the first

was that on which the vine would grow a plentiful supply of good wine;

the second that fit for an irrigated garden; the third for an osier

bed; the fourth for an olive yard; the fifth for a meadow; the sixth

for a corn field; the seventh for a wood lot; the eighth for a

cultivated orchard, and the ninth for a mast grove."

"I know he wrote that," replied Scrofa, "but every one does not agree

with him. There are some who put a good pasture first, and I am among

them."

Our ancestors were wont to call them not _prala_, as we do, but

_parata_ (because they are always ready for use). The sedile Caesar

Vopicus, in pleading a cause before the Censors, once said that the

prairie of Rosea was the nurse of Italy, because if one left his

surveying instruments there on the ground over night they were lost

next day in the growth of the grass.[63]

(_A digression on the maintenance of vineyards_)

VIII. There be those who assert that the cost of maintaining a

vineyard eats up the profit. What kind of vineyard? I ask. For there

are several: in one the vines grow on the ground without props, as in

Spain; in another, which is the kind common in Italy, the vines climb

and are trained either separately on props or one with another on a

trellis, which last is what is called marrying the vine. There are

four kinds of trellis in use--made out of poles, of reeds, of ropes

and of vines themselves, which are in use respectively in Falerum, in

Arpinum, in Brundisium and in Mediolanum. There are two methods of

training the vine on trellises, one upright, as is done in the country

of Canusium; the other crossed and interwoven, as is the practice

generally throughout Italy. If one obtains the material for his

trellises from his own land, the expense of maintaining that kind

of vineyard is negligible, nor is it burdensome if the material is

procured from the neighbourhood. Such trellis material, as has been

described, can be grown at home by planting willows, reeds and rushes,

or some thing of that kind; but if you propose to rely on the vines to

form their own trellis, then you must plant an _arbustum_ where the

vines can be trained on trees, such as maples, which the inhabitants

of Mediolanum use for that purpose; or fig trees, on which the people

of Canusium train their vines. Likewise there are four kinds of props

used for the cultivation of unwedded vines; first, the planted post,

which is called _ridicum_ and is best when fashioned out of oak or

juniper; second, poles cut in the swamp, and the more seasoned they

are the longer they will last, but it is the practice to reset them

upside down when they rot out in the ground; third, for lack of some

thing better, a bundle of reeds tied together and thrust into a

pointed tube of baked clay, which is then planted in the ground and

serves to preserve the reeds from water rot; the fourth is what may be

called the natural prop, when vines are swung from tree to tree. Vines

should be trained to the height of a man and the interval between the

props should be sufficient to give room for a yoke of oxen to plough.

The least expensive kind of a vineyard is that which brings wine to

the jug without the aid of any sort of prop. There are two of this

kind, one in which the earth serves as a bed for the grapes, as in

many places in Asia, and where usually the foxes share the crop with

man;[64] or, if mice appear, it is they who make the vintage, unless

you put a mouse trap in every vine, as they do on the island of

Pandataria. The other kind of vineyard, is that where each shoot which

promises to bear grapes is lifted from the earth and supported about

two feet off the ground by a forked stick: by this means the grapes,

as they form, learn to hang as it were from a branch and do not have

to be taught after the vintage; they are held in place with a bit of

cord or by that kind of tie which the ancients called a _cestus_. As

soon as the farmer sees the vintagers turn their backs he carries

these props under cover for the winter so that he may use them another

year without expense for that account. In Italy the people of Reate

practise this custom.

Thus there are as many methods of cultivating the vine as there are

kinds of soil. For where the land is wet the vine must be trained high

because when wine is being made and matured on the vine, it needs sun,

not water--as when it is in the cup! For this reason it was, I think,

that first the vine was made to grow on trees.

_Of the different kinds of soil_

IX. It is expedient then, as I was saying, to study each kind of soil

to determine for what it is, and for what it is not, suitable. The

word _terra_ is used in three senses: general, particular and mixed.

It is a general designation when we speak of the orb of the earth, the

land of Italy or any other country. In this designation is included

rock and sand and other such things. In the second place, _terra_ is

referred to particularly when it is spoken of without qualification or

epithet. In the third place, which is the mixed sense, when one speaks

of _terra_ as soil--that in which seeds are sown and developed; as for

example, clay soil or rocky soil or others. In this sense there are as

many kinds of earth as there are when one speaks of it in the general

sense, on account of the mixtures of substances in it in varying

quantities which make it of different heart and strength, such as

rock, marble, sand, loam, clay, red ochre, dust, chalk, gravel,

carbuncle (which is a condition of soil formed by the burning of roots

in the intense heat of the sun); from which each kind of soil is

called by a particular name, in accordance with the substances of

which it is composed, as a chalky soil, a gravelly soil, or what ever

else may be its distinguishing quality. And as there are different

varieties of soil so each variety may be subdivided according to

its quality, as, for example, a rocky soil is either very rocky,

moderately rocky or hardly rocky at all. So three grades may be made

of other mixed soils. In turn each of these three grades has three

qualities: some are very wet, some very dry, some moderate, These

distinctions are of the greatest importance in respect of the crops,

for the skilled husbandman plants spelt rather than wheat in wet

land, and on dry land barley rather than spelt, in medium land both.

Furthermore there are still more subtle distinctions to be made

in respect of all these kinds of soil, as for example it must be

considered in respect of loam, whether it is white loam or red loam,

because white loam is unfit for nursery beds, while red loam is what

they require. But the three great distinctions of quality of soil are

whether it is lean or fat, or medium. Fat soils are apparent from the

heavy growth of their vegetation, and the lean lie bare; as witness

the territory of Pupinia (in Latium), where all the foliage is meagre

and the vines look starved, where the scant straw never stools, nor

the fig tree blooms, while for the most part the trees are as covered

with moss as are the arid pastures. On the other hand, a rich soil

like that of Etruria reveals itself heavy with grain and forage crops

and its umbrageous trees are clean of moss. Soil of medium strength,

like that near Tibur, which one might say is rather hungry than

starved, repays cultivation in proportion as it takes on the quality

of rich land."

"Diophanes of Bithynia," said Stolo, "was very much to the point when he

wrote that the best indication of the suitability of soil for

cultivation can be had either from the soil itself or from what grows in

it: so one should ascertain whether it is white or black, if it is light

and friable when it is dug, whether its consistency is ashy, or too

heavy: or it can be tested by evidence that the wild growth upon it is

heavy and fruitful after its kind.[65] But proceed and tell us of your

third division, which relates to the measurement and laying out of the

farm."

_Of the units of area used in measuring land_

X. Scrofa resumed: "Every country has its own system for measuring

land. In Further Spain the unit of area is the _jugum_, in Campania

the _versus_, here in the Roman country and among the Latins it is

the _jugerum_. They call a _jugum_ the area which a pair of oxen

can plough in a day. The _versus_ is one hundred feet square: the

_jugerum_ is the area containing two square _actus_: the _actus

quadratus_ or _acnua_, as it is called by the Latins, measuring 120

feet in width and as much in length.[66] The smallest fraction of a

jugerum is called a _scripulum_ and is ten feet square. From this base

the surveyors some times call the butts of land which exceed a jugerum

_unciae_ (twelfths) or _sextantes_ (seventy seconds) or some other

such duodecimal division, for the jugerum contains 288 scripula, like

the ancient pound weight which was in use before the Punic wars. Two

jugera, which Romulus first made the headright and which thus became

the unit of inheritance, are called an _haeredium_:[67] later one

hundred haeredia were called a _centuria_, which is 2,400 _unciae_

square. Four centuriae adjoining, so that there are two on each side,

are called a _saltus_ in the distribution of the public lands."

_Of the considerations on building a steading_

_a. Size_

XI. As the result of faulty surveys of the farm it often happens that

the steading is constructed either too small or too large for the

farm, a mistake which in either case is of prejudice both to the

property and its revenue. If one builds too large or too many

buildings he is eaten up by the expense of maintenance, while if one

builds less than the farm requires the harvest is lost, for there is

no doubt that the largest wine cellar must be provided for that farm

on which the vintages are largest, or granary, if it is a grain farm.

_b. Water supply_

If possible, the steading should be so built that it shall have water

within the walls, or certainly near at hand: it is preferable that

this should be derived from a spring, or, if not, then from an

unfailing stream. If no running water is available a cistern should be

constructed within doors, and a pond in the open, the one for the use

of the men, the other for the use of the cattle.

_c. Location, with regard to health_

XII. When you plan to build, try your best to locate the steading at

the foot of a wooded hill where the pastures are rich, and turn it so

as to catch the healthiest prevailing breeze. The best situation is

facing the east so to secure shade in summer and sun in winter. But if

you must build on the bank of a river, take care that you do not let

the steading face the river, for it will be very cold in winter and

unhealthy in summer. Like precautions must be taken against swampy

places for the same reasons and particularly because as they dry,

swamps breed certain animalculae which cannot be seen with the eyes

and which we breathe through the nose and mouth into the body where

they cause grave maladies."[68]

"But," said Fundanius, "suppose I inherited a farm like that, what

should I do to avoid the malady you describe?"

"The answer to that question is easy," said Agrius. "You should sell

the farm for what you can get for it: and if you can't sell it, give

it away."

Scrofa resumed: "Take care to avoid having the steading face the

direction from which disagreeable winds blow, yet you should not build

in a hollow. High ground is the best location for a steading: for by

ventilation all noxious gases are dissipated, and the steading is

healthier if exposed to the sun all day: with the further advantage

that any insects which may be bred in or brought upon the premises are

either blown away or quickly perish where there is no damp. Sudden

rains and overflowed streams are dangerous to those who have their

steadings in low or hollow places, and they are more at the hazard of

the ruthless hand of the robber because he is able to take advantage

of those who are unprepared. Against either of these risks the higher

places are safer."

_d. Arrangement_

XIII. In arranging the steading, see that the cattle are put where

they will be warm in winter. Such crops as wine and oil should be

housed below ground in cellars, or rather in jars placed in such

cellars, while dry crops like beans, and hay, are best stored on high

board floors. A rest room should be provided for the comfort of the

hands where they can gather after the day's work or for protection

from cold or heat and there recruit themselves in quiet. The room of

the overseer should be near the entrance to the farm house so that he

may know who comes in and who goes out during the night, and what they

bring in or out, especially if there is no gate-keeper. The kitchen

also should be near the overseer's room because there in winter is

great activity before daylight when food is being prepared and eaten.

Good sized sheds should be built in the barn yard for the wagons and

other implements which might be damaged by the rain. For while they

may be kept safe from the thief within the gates, yet if they are

exposed to the weather they will be lost nevertheless. It is better to

have two barn yards for a large farm. The inner court should contain a

cistern like a little fish pond into which the drainage from the eaves

may collect: as here the cattle and swine and geese can drink and

bathe in summer when they are driven in from work or pasture. In the

outer court there should be another pond where you can handle lupines

and such other things as must be soaked in water. This exterior court

yard should be strewn thick with straw and chaff, which, by being

trampled under the feet of the cattle, becomes the handmaid of the

farm by reason of the service it renders when it is hauled out. Every

farm should have two manure pits, or one divided into two parts; into

one division should be put the new manure from the barn, in the other

the old manure which is ready for use on the farm: for new manure is

not as good as that which is well rotted.[69] The manure pit is more

serviceable when its sides and top are protected from the sun by

leaves and branches, for the sun draws out from the manure those

elements which the land requires; for this reason experienced farmers

sprinkle water on their manure pits, and so largely preserve its

quality: here too some establish the privies for the slaves. One

should build a barracks (what we call a _nubilarium_ because it

affords protection from the weather) and it should be large enough to

contain under its roof the entire crop of the farm: this should be

placed near the threshing floor and left open only on the side of the

threshing floor, so that while threshing you may conveniently throw

out the corn and if it begins to cloud up then quickly throw it back

again under shelter. There should be windows in this barracks on the

side most fitted for ventilation."

"A farm would be more of a farm," said Fundanius, "if the buildings

were constructed with reference to the diligence of our ancestors

rather than the luxury of their descendants. For they built for use,

while we build to gratify an unbridled luxury. Their barns were bigger

than their houses, but the contrary is often the case today. Then a

house was praised if it had a good kitchen, roomy stables and a cellar

for wine and oil fitted, according to the custom of the country, with

a floor draining into a reservoir, into which the wine can flow when,

as often happens after the new wine has been laid by, the fermentation

of the must bursts both Spanish butts and our own Italian tuns. In

like manner our ancestors equipped a country house with whatever other

things were necessary to agriculture, but now on the contrary it is

the effort to make such a house as vast and as elegant as possible,

and we vie with those palaces which men like Metellus and Lucullus

have built, to the detriment of the very state itself: in them the

effort is to contrive summer dining rooms fronting the cool east, and

those designed for use in winter facing the western sun, rather than,

as the ancients did, to adjust their windows with regard chiefly to

the cellars, since wine in casks keeps best when it is cool, while oil

craves warmth. For this reason also it would seem that the best place

to put a house is on a hill, if nothing obstructs it."

_Of the protection of farm boundaries_

_a. Fences_

XIV. "Now," resumed Scrofa, "I will speak of fences, which are

constructed for the protection of the farm or for dividing the fields.

There are four kinds of such barriers: natural, dead wood, military

and masonry. The first is the natural fence of live hedge, consisting

of planted shrubs or thorns, and, as it has roots, runs no risk from

the flaming torch of the passing traveller who may be inclined to

mischief. The second kind is built of the wood of the country, but

is not alive. It is made either of palings placed close together and

wattled with twigs, or posts placed at some distance apart and pierced

to receive the ends of rails, which are generally built two or three

to the panel, or else of trunks of trees laid on the ground and joined

in line. The third, or military fence, consists of a ditch and a

mound: but such a ditch should be so constructed to collect all the

rain water, or it should be graded to drain the surface water off the

farm. The mound is best when constructed close adjoining the ditch, or

else it should be steep so that it will be difficult to scale. It is

customary to construct this kind of fence along the public roads or

along streams. In the district of Crustumeria one can see in many

places along the via Salaria ditches and mounds constructed as dikes

against damage by the river (Tiber).[70] Mounds are some times built

without ditches and are called walls, as in the country around Reate.

The fourth and last kind of fence is of built up masonry. There are

usually four varieties: those of cut stone, as in the country around

Tusculum; those of burned brick, as in Gaul; those of unburned brick

as in the Sabine country; those of gravel concrete,[71] as in Spain and

about Tarentum."

_b. Monuments_

XV. Lacking fences, the more discreet establish the boundaries of

their property, or of their sowings, by blazed trees, and so prevent

neighbourhood quarrels and lawing about corners. Some plant pines

around their boundaries, as my wife did on her Sabine farm, or

cypresses, as I have on my property on Vesuvius.[72] Others plant elms,

as many have done in the district of Crustumeria: indeed, for planting

in plains where it flourishes there is no tree which can be set out

with such satisfaction or with more profit than the elm, for it

supports the vine and so fills many a basket with grapes, yields

its leaves to be a most agreeable forage for flocks and herds, and

supplies rails for fences and wood for hearth and oven.

"And now," said Scrofa, "I have expounded my four points upon the

physical characteristics of a farm, which were, its conformation, the

quality of the soil, its extent and layout, its boundaries and their

protection."

_Of the considerations of neighbourhood_

XVI. It remains to discuss the conditions outside the farm itself,

for the character of the neighbourhood is of the utmost importance to

agriculture on account of the necessary relations with it. There

are four considerations in this respect also, namely: whether the

neighbourhood bears a bad reputation; whether it affords a market to

which our products can be taken and whence we can bring back what we

may require at home; whether there is a road or a river leading to

that market, and, if so, whether it is fit for use; and fourth whether

there is in our immediate vicinity any thing which may be to our

advantage or disadvantage. Of these four considerations the most

important is whether the neighbourhood bears a bad reputation: for

there are many farms which are fit for cultivation but not expedient

to undertake on account of the brigandage in the neighbourhood, as in

Sardinia those farms which adjoin Oelium, and in Spain those on the

borders of Lusitania.

On the second point those farms are the most profitable which have

opportunities in the vicinity for marketing what they raise and buying

what they must consume: for there are many farms which must buy corn

or wine or what ever else they lack, and not a few which have a

surplus of these commodities for sale. So in the suburbs of a city it

is fitting to cultivate gardens on a large scale, and to grow violets

and roses and many other such things which a city consumes, while it

would be folly to undertake this on a distant farm with no facilities

for reaching the market. So, again, if there is nearby a town or a

village or even the well furnished estate of a rich man where you can

buy cheap what you require on the farm, and where you can trade your

surplus of such things as props and poles and reeds, your farm will

be more profitable than if you had to buy at a distance; nay, more

profitable even than if you were able to produce all you require at

home: because in this situation you can make annual arrangements with

your neighbours to furnish on hire the services of physicians, fullers

and blacksmiths to better advantage than if they were your own: for

the death of a single such skilled slave wipes out the entire profit

of a farm. In carrying on the operation of a vast estate, the rich can

afford to provide such servants for every department of the work:

for if towns and villages are far distant from the farm, they supply

blacksmiths and all other necessary craftsmen and keep them on the

place, in order to prevent the hands from leaving the farm and

spending working days in going leisurely to and from the shop when

they might more profitably be engaged on what should be done in the

fields. So Saserna's book lays down the rule that "No one may leave

the farm except the overseer, the butler, or such a one as the

overseer sends on an errand. If any one disobeys this rule, he shall

be punished for it, but if he disobeys a second time the overseer

shall be punished." This rule may be better stated that no one should

leave the farm without the approval of the overseer, and, without the

consent of the master, not even the overseer, for more than a day at

a time, but in no event more frequently than the business of the farm

requires.

On the third point, conveniences of transportation make a farm more

profitable, and these are whether the roads are in such condition that

wagons can use them smoothly, or whether there are rivers nearby which

can be navigated. We know that each of these means of transportation

is available to many farms.

The fourth point, which is concerned with how your neighbour has

planted his land, also relates to your profits: because if he has an

oak forest near your boundary, you cannot profitably plant olives in

that vicinity, for the oak is so perverse in its effect upon the olive

that not only will your trees bear less but they will even avoid the

oaks and bend away from them until they are prostrate on the ground,

as the vine is wont to do when planted near vegetables. Like the oak,

a grove of thickly planted full grown walnut trees renders sterile all

the surrounding land.

2° CONCERNING THE EQUIPMENT OF A FARM

XVII. I have spoken of the four points of husbandry which relate to

the land to be cultivated and also of those other four points which

have to do with the outside relations of that land: now I will speak

of those things which pertain to the cultivation of the land. Some

divide this subject into two parts, men and those assistants to men

without which agriculture cannot be carried on. Others divide it into

three parts, the instruments of agriculture which are articulate,

inarticulate and mute: the articulate being the servants,[73] the

inarticulate the draught animals, and the mute being the wagons and

other such implements.

_Of agricultural labourers_

All men carry on agriculture by means of slaves or freemen or both.

The freemen who cultivate the land do so either on their own account,

as do many poor people with the aid of their own children, or for

wages,[74] as when the heaviest farm operations, like the vintage and

the harvest, are accomplished with the aid of hired freemen: in which

class may be included those bond servants whom our ancestors called

_obaerati_, a class which may still be found in Asia, in Egypt and in

Illyricum. With respect to the use of freemen in agriculture, my own

opinion is that it is more profitable to use hired hands than one's

own slaves in cultivating unhealthy lands, and, even where the country

is salubrious, they are to be preferred for the heaviest kind of farm

work, such as harvesting and storing grapes and corn. Cassius has this

to say on the subject: 'Select for farm hands those who are fitted for

heavy labour, who are not less than twenty-two years of age and have

some aptitude for agriculture, which can be ascertained by trying them

on several tasks and by enquiring as to what they did for their former

master.' Slaves should be neither timid nor overconfident. The foreman

should have some little education, a good disposition and economical

habits, and it is better that they should be some what older than the

hands, for then they will be listened to with more respect than if

they were boys. It is most important to choose as foremen those who

are experienced in agricultural work, for they should not merely give

orders but lend a hand at the work, so that the labourers may learn

by imitation and may also appreciate that it is greater knowledge and

skill which entitles the foreman to command. The foreman should never

be authorized to enforce his discipline with the whip if he can

accomplish his result with words.

Avoid having many slaves of the same nation, for this gives rise to

domestic rows.

The foremen will work more cheerfully if rewards are offered them, and

particularly pains must be taken to see that they have some property

of their own, and that they marry wives among their fellow servants,

who may bear them children, some thing which will make them

more steady and attach them to the place.[75] On account of such

relationships families of Epirote slaves are esteemed the best and

command the highest prices.

Marks of consideration by the master will go far in giving happiness

to your hands: as, for instance, by asking the opinion of those of

them who have done good work, as to how the work ought to be done,

which has the effect of making them think less that they are looked

down upon, and encourages them to believe that they are held in some

estimation by the master.

Those slaves who are most attentive to their work should be treated

more liberally either in respect of food or clothes, or in holidays,

or by giving them permission to graze some cattle of their own on the

place, or some thing of that kind. Such liberality tempers the effect

of a harsh order or a heavy punishment, and restores the slaves' good

will and kindly feeling towards their master.

XVIII. On the subject of the number of slaves one will require for

operating a farm, Cato lays down the two measures of the extent of

the farm and the kind of farming to be carried on. Writing about the

cultivation of olives and vines he gives these formulas, viz.:

For carrying on an olive farm of two hundred and forty jugera,

thirteen slaves are necessary, to-wit: an overseer, a housekeeper,

five labourers, three teamsters, an ass driver, a swineherd and a

shepherd: for carrying on a vineyard of one hundred jugera, fifteen

slaves are necessary, to-wit: an overseer, a housekeeper, ten

labourers, a teamster, an ass driver and a swineherd.

On the other hand Saserna says that one man is enough for every eight

jugera,[76] as a man should cultivate that much land in forty-five

days: for while one man can cultivate a jugerum in four days, yet he

allows thirteen days extra for the entire eight jugera to provide

against the chance of bad weather, the illness or idleness of the

labourer and the indulgence of the master.[77]

At this Licinius Stolo put in.

"Neither of these writers has given us an adequate rule," he said.

"For if Cato intended, as he doubtless did, that we should add to

or subtract from what he prescribes in proportion as our farm is of

greater or less extent than that he describes, he should have excluded

the overseer and the housekeeper from his enumeration. If you

cultivate less than two hundred and forty jugera of olives you cannot

get along with less than one overseer, while if you cultivate twice or

more as much land you will not require two or three overseers. It is

the number of labourers and teamsters only which must be added to or

diminished in proportion to the size of the farm: and this applies

only if the land is all of the same character, for if part of it is of

a kind which cannot be ploughed, as for example very rocky, or on

a steep hillside, there is that much less necessity for teams and

teamsters. I pass over the fact that Cato's example of a farm of two

hundred and forty jugera is neither a fair nor a comparable unit.[78]

The true unit for comparison of farms is a centuria, which contains

two hundred jugera, but if one deducts forty jugera, or one-sixth,

from Cato's two hundred and forty jugera, I do not see how in applying

this rule one can deduct also one-sixth of his thirteen slaves; or,

even if we leave out the overseer and the housekeeper, how one can

deduct one-sixth of eleven slaves. Again, Cato says that one should

have fifteen slaves for one hundred jugera of vineyard, but suppose

one had a _centuria_ half in vines and half in olives, then, according

to Cato's rule, one would require two overseers and two housekeepers,

which is absurd. Wherefore it is necessary to find another measure

than Cato's for determining the number of slaves, and I myself think

better of Saserna's rule, which is that for each jugerum it suffices

to provide four days work of one hand. Yet, if this was a good rule

on Saserna's farm in Gaul, it might not apply on a mountain farm in

Liguria. In fine you will best determine what number of slaves and

what other equipment you will require if you diligently consider

three things, that is to say, what kind of farms are there in your

neighbourhood, how large are they, and how many hands are engaged in

cultivating them, and you should add to or subtract from that number

in proportion as you take up more or less work. For nature gave us two

schools of agriculture, which are experience and imitation. The most

ancient farmers established many principles by experiment and their

descendants for the most part have simply imitated them. We should

do both these things: imitate others and on our own account make

experiments, following always some principle, not chance:[79] thus we

might work our trees deeper or not so deep as others do to see what

the effect would be. It was with such intelligent curiosity that some

farmers first cultivated their vines a second and a third time, and

deferred grafting the figs from spring to summer."

_Of draught animals_

XIX. In respect of those instruments of agriculture which are called

inarticulate, Saserna says that two yokes of oxen will be enough for

two hundred jugera of arable land, while Cato prescribes three yokes

for two hundred and forty jugera in olives: thus if Saserna is

correct, one yoke of oxen is required for every hundred jugera, but if

Cato is correct a yoke is needed for every eighty jugera. My opinion

is that neither of these standards is appropriate for all kinds of

land, but each for some kind: for some land is easy and some difficult

to plough, and oxen are unable to break up some land except by great

effort and often they leave the ploughshare in the furrow broken from

the beam: wherefore in this respect we should observe a triple rule on

every farm, when we are new to it, namely: find out the practice of

the last owner; that of the neighbours, and make some experiments of

our own.

"Cato adds," resumed Scrofa, "that on his olive farm there are

required three asses to haul out the manure and one to turn the mill,

and on his hundred jugera vineyard a yoke of oxen and a pair of asses

for the manure, and an ass for the wine press."

In respect of cattle kept for all these purposes, which it is

customary to feed in the barn yard, it should be added that you should

keep as many and only as many as you need for carrying on the work of

the farm, so that more easily you can secure diligent care of

them from the servants whose chief care is of themselves. In this

connection the keeping of sheep is preferable to hogs not only by

those who have pastures but also by those who have none, for you

should keep them not merely because you have pasture, but for the sake

of the manure.

Watch dogs should be kept in any event for the safety of the farm.

XX. The most important consideration with respect to barn yard cattle

is that the draft oxen should be fit for their work: when bought

unbroken they should not be less than three years old nor more than

four, strong, but well matched, lest the stronger wear out the weaker:

with large horns, black rather than any other color, broad foreheads,

flat noses, deep chests and heavy quarters. Old steers which have

worked in the plains cannot be trained to service in rough and

mountain land; a rule as applicable when reversed. In breaking young

steers it is best to begin by fastening a fork shaped yoke on their

necks and leaving it there even when they are fed; in a few days they

will become used to it and disposed to be docile. Then they should be

broken to work gradually until they are accustomed to it, as may be

done by yoking a young ox with an old one, so that he may learn what

is expected of him by imitation. It is best to work them first on

level ground without a plough, then with a light plough, so that their

first lessons may be easy and in sand and mellow soil.

Oxen intended for the wagon should be broken in the same way, at first

by drawing an empty cart, if possible through the streets of a village

or a town, where they may become quickly inured to sudden noises and

strange sights. You should not work an ox always on the same side of

the team, for an occasional change from right to left relieves the

strain of the work.

Where the land is light, as in Campania, they do not plough with heavy

steers but with cows or asses, as they can be driven more easily to

a light plough. For turning the mill and for carrying about the farm

some use asses, some cows and others mules: a choice determined by the

supply of provender. For an ass is cheaper to feed than a cow, though

a cow is more profitable.[80]

In the choice of the kind of draft animals he is to keep, a farmer

should always take into consideration the characteristics of his soil:

thus on rocky and difficult land the prime requirement is doubtless

strength, but his purpose should be to keep that kind of stock which

under his conditions yields the largest measure of profit and still do

all the necessary work.

_Of watch dogs_

XXI. It is more desirable to keep a few dogs and fierce ones than a

pack of curs. They should be trained to watch by night and to sleep by

day chained in the kennel [so that they may be the more alert when set

loose.]

It remains to speak elsewhere of unyoked cattle, like the flocks, but

if there are meadows on the farm and the owner keeps no live stock, it

is the business of a good farmer after he has sold his hay to graze

and feed another's cattle on his land.

_Of farming implements_