xxii INTRODUCTION 



time and place are chosen with care, and in most 

 cases the names of the interlocutors are suggestive 

 of the subject treated. As a work of art it is not, 

 one must confess, entirely successful; the language 

 is at times slovenly and slip-shod, now jolting along 

 in short and jerky sentences, now trailing through 

 cumbrous and often ungrammatical periods; the 

 conversations degenerate into lectures, and we may 

 look in vain for the graceful ease and urbanity of 

 Cicero or the beautiful lucidity of Columella. Yet 

 there is so much dry and sly humour, such sturdy 

 patriotism, such vigorous sense and here and there 

 such real poetry — in the ore at least (as for instance 

 in the description of the life of the bees in book iii) 

 — the little pictures of urban and rustic life are so 

 vivid, that one feels that a better written book might 

 perhaps be better spared. Varro's style has besides 

 a certain flavour and raciness of its own which one 

 learns to like, and the study of it, beginning with 

 amazement, ends in a sort of love even for its rough- 

 ness and difficulty, so different from the easy fluency 

 of his great friend and rival. 



As a work of science the Rerum Rusticarum is 

 admittedly of distinguished merit. To its composi- 

 tion Varro brought great erudition, practical experi- 

 ence, and much knowledge of the subject gained at 

 first hand from travel in many countries — and used 



