294 VARRO ON FARMING [bk. 



which face south; each must be some ten feet in 

 length, half as much in breadth, and a little less 

 than ten feet in height. In each there should be a 

 window three feet wide and a foot more in height. 

 These windows should be made of osiers with wide 

 interstices, so as to afford plenty of light, and yet 

 preventing from getting through them any of those 

 animals which harm fowls. 

 7 Between the two houses there should be a door 

 for the gallinarius^ their keeper, that is, to enter. 

 In each hen-house there must be numerous perches 

 reaching across it — enough to hold all the hens in 

 fact — and opposite to each perch separate nests 

 should be made for the hens. In front must be, as 

 I said,^ an enclosed court where they may stay in the 

 day-time and take dust-baths. There must be, be- 

 sides, a large- room for the keeper to live in, while 

 all round in the walls are the hens' nests,^ either 



^ Sicut dixi. This refers, no doubt, to the locus saeptus of 

 §6. 



^ Cella grandis. It would appear from the text that hens' 

 nests were disposed round this cella grandis in which the 

 keeper lived. Varro does not state where this was situated, 

 though it was probably between the two hen-houses and cor- 

 responds to Columella's cella viinima {loc. cit). But in the 

 latter there were no nests — only a fireplace ; and if the keeper's 

 cell was between the two hen-houses it is strange that it was 

 not referred to above when the door, which would lead into 

 it, was mentioned. Schneider rightly suspects the text. 



' Plena cuhilia. The meaning of //^'wa— for which the edi- 

 tions before Victorius substituted posita — is dark to me. Keil's 

 explanation is singular: "The nests had to be full, lest the 

 sitting hens should suffer from any movement." But how 



