Special contract-work 265 



parties without going to law. I understand the conductor to be a man 

 who has contracted for the job at an agreed price, and exactor operis 

 just below to be the landlord, whose business it is to get full value for 

 his money. Thus conductor here will be the same as the redemptor so 

 often employed in the scheme of Cato. I cannot find further traces of 

 him in Columella. Nor is the sale of a hanging 1 crop or a season's 

 lambs to a speculator referred to. But we have other authority for 

 believing that contracts of this kind were not obsolete, and it is prob- 

 able that the same is true of contracts for special operations. That 

 such arrangements were nevertheless much rarer than in Cato's time 

 seems to be a fair inference. The manifest reluctance 2 to hire external 

 labour also points to the desire of getting, so far as possible, all farming 

 operations performed by the actual farm-staff. If I have rightly judged 

 the position of tenant farmers, it is evident that their stipulated services 

 would be an important help in enabling the landlord to dispense with 

 employment of contractors' ' gangs on the farm. This was in itself 

 desirable: that the presence of outsiders was unsettling to your own 

 slaves had long been remarked, and in the more elaborate organiza- 

 tion of Columella's day disturbing influences would be more appre- 

 hensively regarded than ever. 



It is hardly necessary to follow out all the details of this compli- 

 cated system and enumerate the various special functions assigned to 

 the members of the staff. To get good foremen even at high prices 

 was one of the leading principles : an instance 3 is seen in the case of 

 vineyards, where we hear of a thoroughly competent vinitor, whose 

 price is reckoned at about 80 of our money, the estimated value of 

 about 4j acres of land. The main point is that it is a system of slave 

 labour on a large scale, and that Columella, well aware that such labour 

 is in general wasteful, endeavours to make it remunerative by strict 

 order and discipline. He knows very well that current lamentations 

 over the supposed exhaustion 4 of the earth's fertility are mere evasions 

 of the true causes of rural decay, neglect and ignorance. He knows 

 that intensive cultivation 5 pays well, and cites striking instances. But 

 the public for whom he writes is evidently not the men on small hold- 

 ings, largely market-gardeners 6 , who were able to make a living with 

 or without slave-help, at all events when within reach of urban markets. 



1 A good instance in Pliny NH Xiv 49, 50. 



2 III 21 10 (of hurry resulting from want of forethought) cogitque plures operas quanto- 

 cumque pretio conducere. 



3 m 3 8. 



4 ipraef i, 2, II i. Cf in 3 4 with Varro I 44 i. 



5 I 3 9 nee dubium quin minus reddat laxus ager non recte cultus quam angustus cximie, 

 iv 3 6. 



6 For milk-delivery see Calpurnius eel iv 25-6 et lac venale per urbem non tacitus porta. 

 For cheese Verg G in 402. 



