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Boox I. AGRICULTURE OF THE ROMANS. 25

operation of similar circumstances produces in him similar results, however distant in time or place.

124, There were threshing implements for ae labor, and for being drawn by horses; and some for striking off the ears of corn(fig. 15.), like what are called rippling combs, for combing off the c capsules of newly pulled fae.

125. A variety of other instruments for cleaning corn, and for the wine and oil press, are mentioned; but too obscurely to admit of exact description.

15

Sussecr. 5. Of the Agricultural Operations of the Romans:

126. Of simple agricultural operations, the most im- portant are ploughing, sowing, and reaping; and of such as are compound, or involve various simple operations, are fallowing, manuring, weeding, and field-watering.

ay 127. Ploughing is universally allowed to be the most important operation of agriculture.‘¢ What,” says

Cato,“is the best culture of land? Good ploughing. What is the second? Ploughing in the ordinary way.[i What is the third? Laying on manure.”(Cap. Ixi.) The AW season for ploughing was any time when land was not wet: 8 Se!=

in the performance, the furrow is directed to be kept equal in ones co Gea one furrow equal to another; and straight furrows. The usual depth is not mentioned, pee it was probably considerable, as Cato says corn-land should be of good quality for two feet in depth. No scamni or balks(hard unmoved soil) were to be left, and to ascertain that this was properly attended to, the farmer is directed, when inspecting the work done, to push a pole into the ploughed land in a variety of places. The plough was generally drawn by one pair of oxen, which were guided by the ploughman without the aid of a driver. In breaking up stiff land, he was expected to plough half an acre; and in free jiands, an acre; and light lands, one and ahalf acre each day. Land, as already noticed(103.), was ploughed in square plots of 120 feet to the side, two of which made a jugerum or acre. A similar practice seems to have existed among the eastern nations, and is probably alluded to in the book of Samuel(chap. xiv. 5. 14.), where Jonathan and his armour-bearer are said to have slain about twenty men within half an acre, or literally“ half a furrow of an acre of land.”

128. Fallowing was a universal praciice among the Romans. Inmost cases, a crop and a year’s fallow succeeded each other; though, when manure could be got, two crops or more were taken in succession; and on certain rich soils, which Pliny describes as favorable for barley, a crop was taken every year. In fallowing, the lands were first ploughed after the crop was removed, generaliy in August; they were again cross- ploughed in spring, and at least a third time before sowing, whether spring corn or win- ter corn was the crop.‘There was, however, no limit to the number of ploughings and sarclings, and when occasion required manual operations; the object being, as Theo- phrastus observes,“ to a the earth feel the cold of winter, and the sun of summer, to invert the soil, and render it free, light, and clear of weeds, so that it can most easily afford nourishment.”(Theo. de Caus. lant. lib. ili. cap. 25.)

129. Manuring was held in such high esteem by the Romans, that immortality was given to Stercutius for the invention.‘They collected it from every source which has been thought of by the moderns, vegetable, animal, and mineral, territorial, aquatic, and marine. Animal dung was divided into three kinds, that which is produced by birds, by men, and by cattle. Pigeon-dung was preferred to all, and next human ordure and urine. Pigeon-dung was used as a top-dressing; and human dung, mixed with clean- ings of the villa, and with urine, was applied to the roots of the vine and the olive.“ M. Varro,” says Pliny,‘“ extols the dung of thrushes from the avaries, as food for swine and oxen, and asserts that there is no food that fattens them more quickly.’’ Varro pre- fers italso as a manure; on which Pliny observes,“‘ we may have a good opinion of the manners of our times, if our ancestors‘had such large aviaries, as to procure from them dung to their fields.”(Nat. Hist. lib. xvii. cap.9.) Dunghills were directed to be placed near the villa, their bottoms hollowed out to retain the moisture, and their sides and top defended from the sun by twigs and leaves. Dung usually remained in the heap a year, and was laid on in autumn and spring, the two sowing seasons. Nomore was to be spread than could be ploughed in the same day.‘Crops that were sickly were revived by sowing over them the dust of dung, especially that of birds, that is, by what is now called a top-“dr essing. Frequent and moderate dungings are recommended as pre- ferable to occasional and very abundant supplies. Green crops, especially lupines, were sown, and before they came into pod ploughed in as manures: they were also cut and buried at the roots of fruit-trees for the same purpose.‘Trees, twigs, stubble,&c. were burned for manure. Cato says,“ If you cannot sell wood and twigs, and have no