146 



as to enable the master of the house to pick them out 

 a few moments before they were served up at table. 



Varro relates some singular particulars about the 

 love which Hortensius had for his fish. He acted with 

 regard to them just as misers do with respect to 

 their money, not daring to make use of it. The 

 orator used to buy fish at the neighbouring towns 

 rather than use his own. 'Not satisfied with sparing 

 them, by prohibiting them to be killed for his own 

 repast, he used to have them fed very plentifully 

 and delicately. Nor was it enough that he did not 

 eat of the fish of his own ponds, he himself feeding 

 them very carefully. * * * Such was Hor- 

 tensius' s turn of mind, that he would sooner have 

 given the mules out of his own stable than a mullet 

 out of his fish pond. He was equally solicitous 

 of the health of his fish as of that of his own ser- 

 vants, and when any one of these was sick, he was 

 less anxious about his having fresh water than about 

 the ordering it for his fish.* 4 



This old Eoman writer's account of his own 

 speculations in fish-ponds has often struck us as con- 

 taining something both curious and quaint. When 

 he was in his eightieth year, he took to writing 

 his book on rural affairs, and he dedicated it to his 

 wife, as it pointed out how she would be able to 

 make something of their farm, when his head was 

 laid low. He says, " AVe have no time, my dear, to 

 loose ; if man's estate be, as we are told it is, a soap 

 bubble at the best, much it behoves an old fellow 



k De Rustica. 



