Roman Farm Management Part 11

_Of condensing amurca_

LXIV. When it flows from the oil mill, amurca is a watery fluid full of dregs. It is the custom to store it in this state in earthen jars and fifteen days later to skim off the sc.u.m from the top and transfer this to other jars, an operation which is repeated at regular intervals twelve times during the following six months, taking care that the last skimming is done on the wane of the moon. Then it is boiled in a copper kettle over a slow fire until it is reduced two-thirds, when it may be drawn off for use.

_Of racking wine_

LXV. When the must is stored in the vat to make wine, it should not be racked off while it is fermenting nor until this process has advanced so far that the wine may be considered to be made. If you wish to drink old wine, it is not made until a year is completed; when it is a year old, then draw it out. But if your vineyard contains that kind of grape which turns sour early, you should eat the fruit, or sell it before the succeeding vintage. There are kinds of wine, like that of Falernum, which improve the longer you keep them.

_Of preserved olives_

LXVI. If you attempt to eat white olives immediately after you have put them up and before they are cured your palate will reject them on account of their bitterness (and the same is true of the black olive) unless you dip them in salt to make them palatable.

_Of nuts, dates and figs_

LXVII. The sooner you use nuts, dates and figs after they have been stored, the more palatable they will be, for by keeping figs lose their flavour, dates rot and nuts dry up.

_Of stored fruits_

LXVIII. Fruits which are strung, such as grapes, apples and sorbs show by their appearance when they may be taken down for use, for by their change of colour and shrinking they reveal themselves as destined to the garbage pile unless they are eaten in time. Sorbs which have been laid by when they are already dead-ripe should be used promptly, but those which were picked green are slower to decay: for green fruit in the store house must there go through the process of ripening which was denied it on the tree.

_Of marketing grain_

LXIX. The spelt which you wish to have prepared for food should be taken out in the winter to be ground in the mill: but your seed corn should not be taken out until the fields are ready to receive it, a rule which obtains in respect of all kinds of seed. What you have for sale should be taken out at the appropriate time also, for some things which cannot be kept long without spoiling should be taken out and sold promptly, while others which keep should be retained so that you may sell when the price is high, for often commodities which are kept on hand a long time, will, if put on the market at the proper time, not only yield interest for the time you held them but even a double profit.

As Stolo was speaking, the freedman of the Sacristan ran up to us with his eyes full of tears and, begging our pardon for having kept us waiting so long, invited us to come to the funeral on the following day. We all sprang up and cried out together "What? To the funeral?

Whose funeral? What has happened?"

The freedman, weeping, told us that his master had been struck down by a blow with a knife, but who did it he had been unable to discover by reason of the crowd, all that he heard being an exclamation that a mistake had been made. He added that when he had carried his master home and had sent the servants to call a doctor, whom they brought back with them quickly, he trusted that it might seem reasonable to us that he had waited to attend upon the doctor rather than come to notify us at once, and while he had not been able to be of any service to his master, who had given up the ghost in a few minutes, yet he hoped we might approve his conduct.

Accepting these excuses as amply justified, we descended from the temple bewildered more by the hazard of human life than surprised that such a fate should be possible at Rome:[104] and so we went our several ways.

BOOK II

THE HUSBANDRY OF LIVE STOCK

_Introduction: the decay of country life_

Those great men our ancestors did well to esteem the Romans who lived in the country above those who dwelt in town. For as our peasants today contemn the tenant of a villa as an idler in comparison with the busy life of an agricultural labourer, so our ancestors regarded the sedentary occupations of the town as waste of time from their habitual rural pursuits: and in consequence they so divided their time that they might have to devote only one day of the week to their affairs in town, reserving the remaining seven for country life.[105]

So long as they persisted in this practice they accomplished two things both that their farms were fertile through good cultivation and that they themselves enjoyed the best of health: they felt no need of those Greek gymnasia which now every one of us must have in his town house, nor did they deem that in order to enjoy a house in the country one must give sounding Greek names to all its apartments, such as [Greek: prokoiton] (antechamber) [Greek: palaistra] (exercising room) [Greek: apodutaerion] (dressing room) [Greek: peristulon] (arcade) [Greek: ornithon] or (poultry house) [Greek: peristereon] (dove cote) [Greek: oporothaekae] (fruitery) and the like.

Since now forsooth most of our gentry crowd into town, abandoning the sickle and the plough and prefer to exercise their hands in the theatre and the circus rather than in the corn field and the vineyard, it has resulted that we must fain buy the very corn that fills our bellies and have it hauled in for us, yea, out of Africa and Sardinia, while we bring home the vintage in ships from the islands of Cos and Chios!

And so it has happened that those lands which the shepherds who founded the city taught their children to cultivate are now, by their later descendants, converted again from corn fields back to pastures, thus in their greed of gain violating even the law, since they fail to distinguish the difference between agriculture and grazing.[106] For a shepherd is one thing and a ploughman another, nor for all that he may feed his stock on farm land is a drover the same as a teamster: herded cattle, indeed, do nothing to create what grows in the land, but destroy it with their teeth, while the yoked ox on the contrary conduces to the maturity of grain in the corn fields and forage in the fallow land. The practice and the art of the farmer is one thing, I say; that of the shepherd another; the farmer's object being that what ever may be produced by cultivating the land should yield a profit; that of the shepherd to make his profit from the increase of his flock; and yet the relation between them is intimate because it is much more desirable for a farmer to feed his forage on the land than to sell it, and a herd of cattle is the best source of supply of that which is the most available food of growing plants, namely, manure:[107]

so it follows that whoever has a farm ought to practise both arts, that of agriculture and that of grazing cattle, indeed, also that of feeding game, as is done at our country houses, since no little profit may be derived from aviaries and rabbit warrens and fish ponds.

And since I have written a book concerning the first of these occupations--that of the husbandry of agriculture--for my wife Fundania because of her interest in that subject, now, my dear Turranius Niger, I write this one on the husbandry of live stock for you, who are so keen a stock fancier that you are a frequent attendant at the cattle market at Macri Campi, where, by your fortunate speculations, you have found means to make provision for many crying expenses.

I could do this on my own authority because I am myself a considerable owner of live stock with my flocks of sheep in Apulia and my stud of horses at Reate, but I will run through the subject, briefly and summarily rehearsing what I gathered from conversation with certain large stock feeders in Epirus at the time when, being in command of the fleet in Greece during the war with the pirates, I lay between Delos and Sicily.[108]

_Of the origin, the importance and the economy of live stock husbandry_

I.[109] When Menates had gone, Cossinius said to me: "We shall not let you go until you have explained those three points which you began to discuss the other day when we were interrupted."

"What three points," said Murrius. "Are they those concerning feeding cattle, of which you spoke to me yesterday?"

"Yes," replied Cossinius, "they are the considerations of what was the origin, what the importance, and what the economy of the husbandry of live stock. Varro here had begun to discourse upon them while we were calling on Petus during his illness, when the arrival of the physician interrupted us."

"Of the three divisions of the [Greek: historikon] or interpretation of this subject, which you have mentioned, I will venture," said I, "to speak only of the first two, of the origin and of the importance of this industry. The third division, of how it should be practised, Scrofa shall undertake for us, as one, if I may speak Greek to a company of half Greek shepherds [Greek: hos per mou pollon ameinon]

(who is better qualified than I am),[110] for Scrofa was the teacher of C. Lucilius Hirrus, your son-in-law, whose flocks and herds in Bruttii have such reputation."

"But," interrupted Scrofa, "you shall hear what we have to say only on condition that you, who come from Epirus and are masters of the art of feeding cattle, shall recompense us and shall give public testimony of what you know on the subject: for none of us knows it all."

Having thus a.s.sumed that my share of the discussion should be the first or theoretical part of the subject (which I did, although I have a stock farm in Italy, because, as the proverb is, not every one who owns a lyre is a musician), I began:

"Doubtless in the very order of nature both man and cattle have existed since the beginning of time, for whether we believe that there was a First Cause of the generation of animals, as Thales of Miletus and Zeno of Citium maintained, or that there was none as was the opinion of Pythagoras of Samos and Aristotle of Stagira, it is, as Dicaearchus points out, a necessity of human life to have descended gradually from the earliest time to the present day: thus in the beginning was the primitive age when man lived on whatever the virgin soil produced spontaneously; thence he descended to the second or pastoral age, when, as he had formerly gathered for his use acorns,[111]

strawberries, mulberries and apples by picking them from trees and bushes, so now, to satisfy a like need, he captured in the woods such as he could of the wild beasts of the field, and, having enclosed, began to domesticate them. Among these it is considered not without reason that sheep were foremost, both because of their utility and because of their docile nature, for this animal is the gentlest of all and most readily accommodated to the life of man, and supplies him with milk and cheese for food, and skins and wool to clothe his body.

"Finally, by the third step, man descended from the pastoral age to that of agriculture. In this there have persisted many relics of the two preceding ages, which, long remaining in their original state, are found even in our day: for in many places may yet be seen some kinds of our domestic cattle still in their wild state, such as the large flocks of wild sheep in Phrygia, and in Samothrace a species of wild goats like those which are called "big horns" (platycerotes) and abound in Italy on the mountains of Fiscellum and Tetrica. Every body knows that there are wild swine, unless you maintain that the wild boar is not a true member of the swine family.

"There are still many cattle running at large in Dardania, Medica and Thrace, while there are wild a.s.ses in Phrygia and Lycaonia, and wild horses in certain regions of hither Spain.

"I have now told you of the origin of the industry of feeding cattle.

As to its importance, I have this to say:

"The most important persons of antiquity were all keepers of live stock, as both the Greek and Latin languages reveal, as well as the earliest poets, who describe their heroes some as [Greek: polyarnos]

(rich in lambs), some as [Greek: polymaelos] (rich in sheep), and others as [Greek: polyboutaes] (rich in herds), and tell of flocks which on account of their value were said to have golden fleeces, like that of Atreus in Argos which he complained that Thyestes stole away from him: or that ram which Aeetes sacrificed at Colchis, whose fleece was the quest of those princes known as the Argonauts: or again like those so called golden apples (_mala_) of the Hesperides that Hercules brought back from Africa into Greece, which were, according to the ancient tradition, in fact goats and sheep which the Greeks, from the sound of their voice, called [Greek: maela]: indeed, much in the same way our country people, using a different letter (since the bleat of a sheep seems to make more of the sound of _bee_ than of _me_) say that sheep "be-alare," whence by the elision of a letter as often happens, is derived the word _belare_ (or _balare_), to bleat.

"If cattle had not been held in the highest esteem among the ancients the astrologers would not have called the signs of the zodiac by their names in describing the heavens: and they not only did not hesitate to place them there but many even begin their enumeration of the twelve signs with these animal names, thus giving Aries and Taurus precedence over Apollo and Hercules, whose signs, very G.o.ds as they are, are subordinated under the name of Gemini: nor did they deem that a sixth of these twelve signs was a sufficient proportion for the names of cattle, but they must even add Capricornus and make it a quarter.

Furthermore, in naming the constellations they selected other names of cattle, as the goat, the kid, and the dog. And in like manner have not certain parts both of the sea and of the land taken their names from cattle, as witness the Aegean Sea, which is called after the Greek name for goat [Greek: aigeos], and Mount Taurus in Syria after the bull, and Mount Cantherius in the Sabine country after the horse, and the Thracian, as well as the Cimmerian, Bosphorus, after the ox: and again many place names on land like the town in Greece known as [Greek: hippion Argos], or horse breeding Argos. Yea, Italy itself derives its name, according to Piso, from _vitula_, our word for heifer.

"Who can deny that the Roman people themselves are sprung from a race of shepherds, for every one knows that Faustulus, the foster father of Romulus and Remus, who brought them up, was a shepherd. Is it not proof that they were shepherds that they chose the Parilia, or feast of the G.o.ddess of the shepherds, in preference to all other days, for the founding of the city; that a penalty even to this day is a.s.sessed in terms of cattle or sheep, according to the ancient custom; that our most ancient money, the _as_ of cast copper, always bore the effigy of some domestic animal; that whenever a town was founded the limits of the walls and the gates were laid off with a plough drawn by a bull and a cow yoked together; that when the Roman people are purified it is done by driving around them a boar, a ram and a bull, whence the sacrifice is known as the Suovetaurilia; that we have many family names among us derived from both the great and small cattle: thus from small cattle Porcius, Ovinius, Caprilius, and from great cattle Equitius, Taurius, and some of our families have received from cattle cognomens which signify for what they are esteemed, as, for instance, the Annius family are called Capra, the Statilius family are called Taurus and the Pomponius family are called Vitulus, and so many others are derived from cattle.

"It remains now to discuss the art of animal husbandry, and on this subject our friend Scrofa, to whom this age has awarded the palm for excellence in all branches of farm management, will say what ever is to be said, as he is better qualified than am I."

When all eyes had been turned upon him, Scrofa began:

"Doubtless the art of breeding and of feeding cattle consists in getting the maximum profit out of those things from which the very name of money is derived, for our word for money (_pecunia_) comes from _pecus_, cattle, which is the foundation of all wealth.

"Our enquiry may be divided into nine subjects, or three parts each with three subdivisions, namely: (i) concerning small cattle, of which the three kinds are sheep, goats and swine: (2) concerning large cattle, which are likewise divided by nature into three species, neat cattle, a.s.ses and horses: and (3) concerning those instruments of animal husbandry which are not kept for profit but for convenience, namely: mules, dogs and shepherds. Each of these nine subjects must be considered under nine heads: (a) four relating to the acquisition of cattle, (b) four to the care of them, and (c) one which has to do with all the others. So there are at least eighty-one chapters for discussion of the subject, all indispensable and all of great importance.