180 Classes of labour 



theories and experience of the past. For instance, in estimating the 

 staff required, he insists 1 on its being proportioned to the scale of the 

 work to be done : as the average day's work (opera) varies in efficiency 

 according to the soil, it is not possible to assign a definite number of 

 hands to a farm of definite area. Nor is he content simply to take 

 slave-labour, supplemented by hired free labour and contract-work, 

 for granted. In a short but important passage he discusses the 

 labour-question, with reasons for the preference of this or that class 

 of labour for this or that purpose, of course preferring whichever is 

 likely to give the maximum of profit with the minimum of loss. 



It is this passage 2 that is chiefly of interest from my present point 

 of view, and I will therefore translate it in full. 



' So much for the four conditions 8 of the farm that are connected 

 with the soil, and the second four external to the farm but bearing 

 on its cultivation. Now for the appliances used in tillage. Some 

 classify these under two heads (a) men (b) the implements necessary 

 for their work. Others under three 4 heads (a) the possessed of true 

 speech (b) the possessed of inarticulate speech (c) the speechless. In 

 these classes respectively are included 6 (a) slaves (b) oxen (c) waggons, 

 and such are the three kinds of equipment. The men employed in 

 all tillage are either slaves or freemen or both. Free labour is seen 

 in the case of those who till their 8 land themselves, as poor peasants 7 

 with the help of their families mostly do : or in that of wage-earners 8 , 

 as when a farmer hires free hands to carry out the more important 

 operations on his farm, vintage or hay-harvest and the like : such also 

 are those who were called "tied men" 9 in Italy, a class still numerous 

 in Asia Egypt and Illyricum. Speaking of these 10 as a class, I main- 

 tain that in the tillage of malarious land 11 it pays better to employ 

 free wage-earners than slaves ; even in a healthy spot the more im- 

 portant operations, such as getting in vintage or harvest, are best so 

 managed. As to their qualities, Cassius writes thus : in buying 12 

 labourers you are to choose men fit for heavy work, not less than 22 

 years of age and ready to learn farm-duties. This you can infer from 

 giving them other tasks and seeing how they perform them, or by 



I KR I 18. 3 fix j I7> 3 RR 



4 \genus\ vocale, semivocale, mutum. 



6 These are specimens only. Others would be hired freemen, asses, and (near a river) 

 barges. 



6 ipsi suggests peasant owners. f pauperculi cum sua progenie. 



8 mercennariis...eondiicticiis liberorum operis. 



9 obaerarios or obaeratos, who work off a debt by labour for a creditor. 



10 de quibus universis. This seems to refer to all human workers. 



II grama loca. Cf I 12 2. 



12 operarios parandos esse, not condticendos, for these are clearly slaves. Cf I 16 4. 



