168 AGEICULTURE. 



when they began to form seeds. By the writers generally 

 more benefit is attributed to this practice than modem 

 experience would appear to justify. It is true that in the 

 Roman course of a crop and a fallow no time was lost by it. 

 The opinion also that some crops, even when gathered, 

 improved the land, did prevail for Columella, who strongly 

 advocates the ploughing-in system, thinks it necessary to 

 combat it : 



" Some tell us that a crop of beans stand in the place 

 of a manuring to the land which opinion I would inter- 

 pret thus; not that one can make the land richer by 

 sowing them, but that this crop will exhaust it less than 

 some others. For of this I am certain, that land which 

 has had nothing on it will produce more corn than that 

 which has borne these pulse in the preceding year." 

 An opinion in which we cordially coincide. 



Roman harvesting presents several variations from Bri- 

 tish practices. In some cases the ears of the standing 

 corn were gathered by a sort of comb, cut off, and carried 

 to the thrashing floor the straw being cut by a subse- 

 quent operation. The mode in which this was done is ac- 

 curately described by the writers, and is vividly portrayed 

 in the drawings from the Egyptian tombs. This plan is 

 said to have answered well in thin crops, but to have been 

 troublesome when they were heavy ; it would no doubt be 

 still more so when they were laid and twisted. In other 

 cases the corn was cut low, arid having been gathered to- 

 gether, was passed through combs or hackles, which detained 

 the ears. These being cut off, were carried away separately 

 in wicker-baskets. Pliny remarks, that both these modes 

 are favourable to straw which is to be used for thatching. 

 About Rome the corn was cut in the middle by a sickle. Varro 

 is of opinion that from this cutting in the middle, the word 

 messis was derived. The upper part of the straw was called 

 palea, and was used for fodder ; the butt ends, stramentum, 

 were used as litter. In some countries they pulled up all 

 their corn by the roots, and fancied, says Pliny, that the 



